“In this series, I wanted to create a portrait of a whole city through stolen moments of people traversing the capital, moments which are private and enclosed, but crowded in by strangers. By presenting the figures in a rigid grid format, I wanted to heighten this sense of figures isolated amidst bustling chaos, and perhaps also to suggest something of specimens in a display case.”

London-based creative Ben Chisnall is a self-taught artist working primarily in oils and acrylics.

A portrait of a city in transit, Londoners Underground celebrates the diversity of the capital and attempts to capture something of the experience of negotiating a city of 8 million strangers living in close proximity. It is part of a five-year project observing the lives of his fellow city dwellers, the ordinary and not-so-ordinary, all doing that most mundane and levelling of all London’s activities: taking the Tube.

Rather than attempting a likeness, every portrait is worked from a combination of quick sketches, photos and notes taken on the London Underground between 2018 and 2023. Elements from different travellers are freely combined: a particularly striking pose of one with the outfit or hairdo of another, with the expression or features of a third. Thus, the lines between portraiture and the creation of an imagined character are blurred.

The series now counts some 250 individual paintings, with each work painted in oils on a hand-prepared wood panel. 

Ben has exhibited with the Islington Art Society, where he twice won the People’s Choice Award. In November 2022, he held a solo show at the Barbican Centre entitled Londoners Underground: Private Worlds in Public Places, selections have been included in this show, his latest exhibition.

Opening times: West Norwood Picturehouse | West Norwood Cinema | Showtimes

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