Artist-led: Auction House

Can you tell us about Auction House, who you are and what you're about/what you do.

Auction House is an artist-led project and exhibition space that I, [Liam Jolly], established in 2018 in Redruth, Cornwall, with the intention of creating a space for artists to experiment, test new ideas and show work. There weren't many opportunities for artists locally, so it felt important to offer a flexible platform where artists could make things happen, rather then needing to wait for organisations to do this for us.

The space has since become a dynamic venue for exhibitions, residencies and events, supporting both local emerging talent and national/international artists.

Auction House operates as a project space come gallery, committed to contemporary art, community engagement and fostering connections between artists and audiences.

Because it is artist-initiated and led, the space is oriented toward risk-taking, experimentation and dialogue - providing opportunities for artists to develop ambitious and challenging work, and for audiences in Cornwall to encounter new and diverse contemporary practices.

Can you tell us why you set up and why an artist-led approach, and how Auction House are important in the context that you are working in?

Auction House was set up largely by accident and began as an extension of my studio. I moved into the building in 2017, and over the following year, I established the space as a studio and music rehearsal/recording space. I ‘white-cubed’ the additional space available with the intention that friends and other artists could use it to test ideas, experiment, and document work. It was never intended to be public-facing.

However, with prior experience of artist-led projects such as Tadis Projects in Truro, and as a co-founder of CMR Project Space in Redruth, the pull to activate the space publicly became hard to resist. Post-Covid, this shifted significantly, and over an 18 month period I staged 26 exhibitions before having to vacate the building in 2022 due to a major renovation of the Buttermarket, of which Auction House is part.

Can you describe what sort of space you run out of / the context of Auction House, and how you operate / are funded?

The Auction House space forms part of the Buttermarket, a Grade II - listed heritage building complex in the centre of Redruth. When I moved in during 2017, the landlords, Redruth Revival, had recently acquired the site with the intention of securing funding to support its long-term renovation.

We moved out in 2022 while the Buttermarket underwent redevelopment, and the site was subsequently re-established as a mixed-use food and culture hub, incorporating street food kitchens, bars, markets, workspaces and a radio station headquarters. Auction House returned to the site in March this year.

Until relocating back to the Buttermarket, Auction House had operated without external funding. The move into the new space has brought increased rent and operational costs, making it necessary to seek funding to sustain the programme.

I have recently secured an Arts Council England project grant (the first time Auction House has had funding from ACE), which will support activity through to May next year. Beyond this period, the continuation of Auction House will depend on securing further resources and adapting its model in response to changing conditions.

Can you tell us about what you are currently working on and if you have any projects coming up you’d like to share with our network?

We have just had an amazing show with Northern Irish artist Matthew Wilson, a Freelands Foundation Fellow currently based at Falmouth University until March.

In March, Alice Mahoney will present a solo exhibition as part of her Arts Council–funded project Water Bodies, an ongoing exploration of lost and existing water sites across Camborne and Redruth. The work draws on material experimentation with waste clay from the area’s post-industrial landscape and local watercourses.

We will also be hosting a two-site group show: half of the work will be exhibited in a charity shop on Redruth’s high street, with the remainder shown in the AH space — it should be a fun one.

In April and May we’ll be showing solo shows by Naomi Frears and Simon Bayliss.

This February, we’re also launching our first ‘After Hours’ (see what we did there) club night, OUTLAND. The project is by Kieran Bland and Toby Sadgrove, two participants from Mark Leckey’s Music & Video Lab project that Auction House ran back in 2022, and it feels great to see this emerge as a legacy of that original programme.

There is much more to come in 2026!

Find out more
www.auctionhouseart.co.uk
@auctionhouseart
@liam.jolly