11th September 2026 – Exhibition

In his latest series of paintings, Patrick Redmond replaces individual subjects with ventriloquist dummies and mannequins, occupying an uncanny territory between object and person. Painted in monochrome, the works evoke classic studio publicity stills while quietly undoing their promise of charm and control.

Familiar faces become strange: fixed smiles, hollowed eyes, and subtly artificial expressions introduce an uncanny tension. The archetype of the 1940s actor represents an early model of the constructed public self carefully lit, styled, and shaped by powerful systems of image-making. The paintings reference archival photography and memory, emphasizing surface, contrast, and mediation. They are not portraits of individuals, but of images already distanced from lived experience. The addition of ventriloquist dummy features makes this distance explicit, turning metaphor into form.

For Redmond, ventriloquism displaces voice and agency: the dummy appears animated while another entity speaks through it, a dynamic that resonates strongly with contemporary life, in which identities are increasingly performed through curated images, avatars, and scripted personas. The frozen smile suggests the pressures of visibility and the expectation of constant presentation, where complexity and ambiguity are smoothed away.

By collapsing Hollywood’s past with present-day anxieties about authenticity and control, the series suggests that the performance of identity has not diminished but intensified. These portraits ask who is truly speaking today, and whether the selves we present are animated from within or expertly operated from elsewhere. 

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