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A Llandudno gallery has scored a UK first, securing a solo show from an exciting international artist to launch its 2023 season

To open 2023, Mostyn is proud to present the first UK institutional solo exhibition by Mexican-German artist Stefan Brüggemann. In his art as well as his own artistic and cultural identity he defies categorisation. ‘Not Black, Not White, Silver’ presents “the grey area in between”, across the artist’s work from the past 20 years.

Brüggemann’s art-making reflects on the paradoxes of society using language and carefully chosen materials. Born in Mexico City and dividing his time between Mexico, London and Ibiza, he represents a strange merger of conceptualism and minimalism, refined and luxurious whilst maintaining a punk edge.

Challenging the viewer

Spanning sculpture, video, painting and drawing, Brüggemann uses text friendly, it opened in 2022 and presents the finest Welsh art and craft in mediums including painting, jewellery, ceramics, sculpture, glass, textiles, wood and metalwork. It is already being described as one of the most important galleries in the country.

Work by 50 artists is on display, all of them from Wales. Everything is for sale and there is something for every budget. The gallery sits in the grounds of Glasfryn Hall, which is opened for special exhibitions and at other times by appointment. www.oriel glasfryn.com in installations that are rich in social critique and a post-pop aesthetic. In the middle gallery at Mostyn, Headlines and Last Lines in the Movies (Guernica), commands attention with overlays of contemporary headlines and closing lines from historically important drama, spray-painted in red, white and blue.

‘Horizon Garden’, Ty Pawb, Wrexham. Until 8th April. This group exhibition will explore community and alternative growing, in response to climate change, social isolation, loneliness and food poverty. It will profile examples of useful art/social art projects including GRAFT, Granby Winter Garden, Company Drinks, Coedpoeth Community Garden and others.

Emphasising the wellbeing benefits of nature, the exhibition will also serve as a lush and vibrant green escape for visitors, featuring work by visual artists Morag Colquhoun, Owen Gri ths, Jackie Kearsley, Sumuyya Khader, Jonathan LeVay, Ann McCay, Aidan Myers and Alessandra Saviotti.

On display will also be a selection of artwork loaned from Amgueddfa Cymru including work by Graham Sutherland, Maurice de Vlaminck and Dr Harold Drinkwater. Open Mon-Sat 10am-4pm.

With superimposed texts and spray paint in black, the plywood wall Hyper-Palimpsest (2019) in the next gallery further challenges legibility and interpretation and is accompanied by audio of Iggy Pop reading the artist’s entire catalogue of text statements. The neon works I can’t explain and I won’t even try (2003) and This work is realised when it is destroyed (2014) confront the idea of meaning and art with a marked absence. In creating these spaces of doubt, Brüggemann invites the viewer in. While the layering of texts challenges legibility, it also allows for multiple possibilities. Not Black, Not White, Silver is at Mostyn, Vaughan St, Llandudno from 18th March17th June. Tues-Sat 10.30am-4pm. Free.

Portraits from The Tabernacle Collection, MOMA, Machynlleth. Until 22nd April

MOMA displays portraits from its own Tabernacle Collection including works by Augustus John, Peter Edwards, John Bratby, Ruskin Spear, Michael Kidd, Michael Tomlinson, Meirion Alan Ginsberg, Gladys Vasey, Mervyn Levy, and the latest portrait to be added to the collection: Island Man (The Bardsey Boy) by Brenda Chamberlain.

The Williamson Open 2023, The Williamson Gallery, Birkenhead, Wirral. Until 29th April

The 60th edition of the Williamson Open Art & Photography Exhibition is fast approaching. Every year since 1962 (barring 2021 due to the pandemic), the Williamson Open has aimed to reflect the current active visual arts scene in Wirral. Entry is open to artists and photographers who have connections with Wirral through birth, education, residency or occupation. Work in all media is accepted.