A Mixed Exhibition is now at The Eyestorm Gallery, 27-29 St Nicholas Street Ipswich until the end of January.This year promises to be an exciting one for the Eyestorm Gallery.

A Mixed Exhibition is now at The Eyestorm Gallery, 27-29 St Nicholas Street Ipswich until the end of January.

This year promises to be an exciting one for the Eyestorm Gallery. In February they will be showing a small selection of exclusive limited edition prints by Peter Blake; possibly the most successful British Pop Artist of all time. Blake, who designed the legendary Beatles record cover Sgt Pepper and the Lonely Hearts Club, is still very much at the forefront of British Art, and highly collectable. The gallery also plans a solo exhibition featuring the paintings of Ben Allen; whose fans include Virgin boss Richard Branson.

You can get a taster of Allen's work in the current mixed exhibition. Interestingly one of his paintings, Revolver Mini, has a definite 60s and Peter Blake feel. The image shows a glamorous model in a scanty swimsuit affront a revolver barrel. As in Forbidden Fruit, also acrylic, spray paint, and silkscreen, the palette is daring and bright. Both images feature a female, are erotic, utilise pattern, and are sexually empowering. The latter's influences include Victoriana, graphic art, and typography.

Allen's Secret City, acrylic, collage, ink marker, spray, is less graphic. Here we are presented with a multi-layered urban landscape in which symbols, including a tiger, graffiti, multi-storey car parks, city apartments, and pattern vie for your attention. The result is an exciting, rich, and pertinent painting. I look forward to Allen's solo show.

The exhibition also includes Jonathan Boast's stunning acrylic painting Urban Routes; a work of intense movement in which vivid colour blurs and blends before your eyes. Startling. Also interesting are Henrietta Stuart's large paintings Flotilla and Shifting Light; the oils are sensitively blended to create an airy elusive effect in which the skies dominate the compositions. Clare Johnson's silkscreen, mono print, and watercolour compositions are much starker. Her images, which include the wittily titled Tiara of Pancras Bird 3, explore the changing global environment, and although topical have historical echoes; all resembling an over-sized old postcard or postage stamp. NW Design's Cork's, a work made up of hundreds of wine corks arranged in the manner of parquet flooring, is striking, clever, and also a superb exercise in recycling.

I've mentioned just a few of the works in this mixed exhibition which also includes a sale. An enjoyable experience.

Sonia Carvill