A suite of sensitive portraits, that highlight their subject's made-up faces, capture Cathy Lomax’s attention.
A solo presentation of Sarah Ball’s work at Stephen Friedman Gallery stood out for me amongst the noise and chaos of Frieze. The stand is dominated by a large painting, Anthony and Mr Young McNair, 2025, featuring two figures in tones of pink and lilac wearing turbans and patterned tunics (Ball’s first double portrait). But it is not this work that drew me in.
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| Sarah Ball, coloured pencil on paper portraits, 2025 |
Rather it is a suite of smallish close-ups of faces, softly drawn in coloured pencil on paper, which immediately make them more intimate than the formal, harder edged, oil on canvas paintings that Ball is best known for. The close-up portraits focus on the way each individual, gender-fluid subject, has styled their face – augmenting it with lipstick, blusher, eyeshadow, glam rock style drawn shapes and tendrils of hair to create the person they want to be seen as.
It occurs to me that coloured pencil is ideal for rendering the made-up faces as it is so like a stick of makeup. There is also a sense that these drawings could be from a makeup manual or a vintage teen magazine – they have a wistful quality which really appeals to me. Above all they are gentle, sympathetic and modestly fabulous, all of which makes the Stephen Friedman stand an inviting escape from the hubbub of the fair.
Cathy Lomax
Frieze and Frieze Masters
The Regent's Park
15-19 October 2025
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