Catherine Repko: Duets
6th June, 2025 – 5th July, 2025
HUXLEY-PARLOUR
3–5 Swallow Street
London W1B 4DE
Catherine Repko’s Quiet Study of Human Connection and the Space Between at Huxley-Parlour
A new exhibition by Catherine Repko has opened at Huxley-Parlour’s Swallow Street gallery. Titled Duets, the show brings together a series of large-scale paintings that quietly examine the relationship between two figures, and the emotional terrain that lies between them.
Rather than illustrating scenes or telling stories, Repko’s works suggest a kind of shared interior space. Her paired subjects—often female—appear absorbed, leaning towards or away from one another, caught in gestures that seem both deliberate and momentary. There is an ease to their closeness, but also a reserve; a sense that each figure remains, in some way, apart.
The title hints at harmony, but also separation—two distinct voices, moving in relation to one another without necessarily merging. In one canvas, outstretched arms mirror each other’s shape without quite meeting. In another, one figure turns slightly away, the angle of her neck suggesting quiet withdrawal or contemplation.
Repko’s painting style complements this subtle emotional register. Her use of colour is restrained but expressive—layers of oil shifting between thick, opaque passages and areas of soft translucence. Backgrounds dissolve into loose fields of tone, never fully defining the space but giving it a certain mood or temperature.
Amid the pairings, one work stands apart. A single figure, rendered against a backdrop of earthy yellows and ochres, glances over her shoulder towards something unseen. Her presence is solitary, but not isolated. If anything, she becomes a key to the rest of the exhibition—hinting that the other figures might be reflections of the same self, or moments drawn from memory rather than direct experience.
There is a quiet restlessness throughout the show. Knees bend, arms extend, torsos twist slightly—as if the figures are caught just before or after something has happened. This sense of flux lends the paintings a psychological charge, but Repko never pushes it too far. She allows space for ambiguity, for uncertainty, for viewers to find their own way in.
Duets is a thoughtful, restrained body of work—one that doesn’t demand attention, but holds it. Through a language of gesture, tone and space, Repko explores what it means to be close to another person, and what it means to remain, even in that closeness, quietly alone.
About Catherine Repko
Catherine Repko was born in the United States in 1990. She completed a foundation in Art and Design at Chelsea College of Art, London in 2010 before obtaining a BA in Visual Communication from the University of Brighton in 2013. She graduated with an MA in Painting at the Royal College of Art in 2021. Repko was the recipient of The Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation in 2020 and the Triangle Network Fellowship from The Arts Council England in 2016. Repko’s work has been exhibited in London, New York, Brussels and Milan. She lives and works in London.
Catherine Repko: Duets opens on the 6th of June, 2025 until the 5th of July, 2025 at HUXLEY-PARLOUR
©2025 HUXLEY-PARLOUR
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