Inward Light I–IV at Women in Art London Biennale 2026

Chelsea Old Town Hall, London · 20–23 August 2026

Marina Iljusina with Inward Light I–IV at Women in Art London Biennale 2026, Chelsea Old Town Hall, London.

I haven’t written here for a while, although a great deal has happened in the meantime. Over the coming weeks, I would like to gradually return to some of those moments, exhibitions and experiences.

I want to begin with the most recent one.

In August 2026, my mixed media relief series Inward Light I–IV was presented at Women in Art London Biennale 2026 at Chelsea Old Town Hall, London.

The exhibition brought together women artists from different countries and practices, creating a diverse environment of painting, sculpture, mixed media and contemporary visual expression.

Seeing the four works installed together outside the studio gave me an opportunity to experience the series differently - in relation to the exhibition space, other artworks and the people encountering it.

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Women in Art Biennale London 2026, organised by Artio Gallery.

Installation view: Inward Light I–IV, Women in Art London Biennale 2026.

About the series

Inward Light I–IV is a series of four mixed media wall reliefs built around quiet, mask-like faces emerging from circular grounds.

They are not intended as portraits or decorative masks, but as objects of inward presence.

Through plaster gauze, acrylic, textured surfaces and delicate material connections, the series explores silence, memory, vulnerability and inward attention.

The works exist somewhere between painting, sculpture and object. Their restrained palette and tactile surfaces invite a slower kind of looking - less concerned with immediate image and more with material, trace and presence.

Detail of Inward Light I–IV, showing the relief structure and textured surface.

Detail of material connections and textured surface.

A personal moment

Seeing the series installed at Chelsea Old Town Hall was both exciting and unfamiliar.

These works were created quietly, through a slow and intuitive process. In the studio, I had experienced them primarily as individual objects. On the exhibition wall, however, the four pieces began to function as a single sequence.

There was a moment when I stood in front of them and realised that the works no longer belonged only to the private space in which they had been created.

They had entered another context - one shaped by viewers, conversations, distance and light.

That shift was important to me.

Beyond the studio

One of the most valuable parts of exhibiting is seeing how people respond to work without explanation.

Visitors stopped, looked closely and approached the pieces from different distances. Some were drawn first to the faces, others to the textures, materials and fine connections running across the surfaces.

For me, these encounters became another way of understanding the series - not as something finished and closed, but as work that continues to change through the experience of being seen.

Visitors viewing Inward Light I–IV during the exhibition.

Acknowledgements

Thank you to Artio Gallery and Women in Art London Biennale for presenting my work, and to everyone who visited, spoke with me, wrote, supported or shared kind words during the exhibition.

I am grateful for the opportunity to see Inward Light I–IV in a public exhibition context and to reflect on how these works communicate beyond the studio.

Exhibition: Women in Art London Biennale 2026

Venue: Chelsea Old Town Hall, London

Dates: 20–23 August 2026

Artist: Marina Iljusina

Works: Inward Light I–IV

Medium: Mixed media relief - plaster gauze, acrylic and textured material

Year: 2026

Dimensions: 30 × 30 × 9 cm each

This experience became an important point of reflection in my practice - about silence, material presence and the space that emerges between the work and the viewer.