RENTERS! brings together artistic practices from UAL students and recent graduates to formulate discussion around the living conditions of students in London. The exhibition builds on research carried out in Arts SU’s Private Renters Report, which revealed huge levels of dissatisfaction with the private rental sector, and how it impacts students’ physical, emotional and mental wellbeing.
Over 300 students shared their experiences with us on a wide range of topics including affordability of accommodation, property conditions, and the impact of their living situation on their health. We are incredibly grateful to every student who responded and shared their experience with us.
The exhibition includes artworks by students from a variety of courses and colleges across UAL. Through sculpture, painting, photography, video, design and other multidisciplinary practices, RENTERS! critically engages with wider conversations around tenants’ rights, guardianship, impacts on health and wellbeing, privatisation, and art and gentrification. Through this exhibition we hope to generate discussion about how both the University and Arts SU can support students who are balancing the priorities of their studies, with a high-cost yet low-quality private rental market. We believe this exhibition will connect with communities to see the common ground and actions that can be taken as a collective, and call attention to wider issues of renting across London and the UK.
ARIN HE
BA Fine Art, CSM
Cling, 2024
35mm film collage, digital print
Cling was shot in double exposure rendering the living environment of two international students in London. The transparent nature of this work was made possible with multiple layers of opaque images overlapping each other.
The boundaries of photographs were blurred with everyday-used objects filling up all the gaps, visualising this crowded, less-of-an-ideal residential space in central London. As international students, the idea of home and housing are extended beyond one single space within one country. The location and space can be stretched along the globe, and each of their meaning mixes and mingles with each other across the student’s timeline of traveling and growth. Their belongingness and identity go along this chaotic journey as their understanding of who they are and who they represent change and evolve with the place they reside.
Artist Bio
My art making space is to me both shelter and exposure. As the artworks often magnify many detailed and commonly unnoticed sites, amongst my living environment, the paths I walked along, and the places I traveled to. I built my collections of daily sites and philosophical investigations within the archive of photographic memories, which intertwines with my identity and vulnerability as I carry on my journey through life.
BETH WEBSTER
BA Graphic Design & Communication, LCC
Waiting, 2024
Oil pastel, oil paint, collage
This artwork is a response to my frustration in the depths of winter, when my flat had no heating. I would wait for the bus on my estate thinking how my flat felt as cold as the outdoors. I felt vulnerable in my skin and was prone to illness. I felt like I had no real ‘home’ that could offer me the warmth I needed, hence why I was always on the bus, travelling someplace else. With interchangeable panels granting different interpretations—one bus becomes two, symbolising the seemingly infinite cold days. The skyline depicted is the view from my flat window.
Beth Webster is a queer multidisciplinary designer from Nottingham, focused on the fluctuating relationship between humans and the natural world. Fascinated by the paradox of liminal cityscapes, they highlight a culture of loneliness collectively repressed by Londoners. Beth believes design can effectively tackle urgent ecological complexities in a visually-driven society.
Artist Bio
CHARLOTTE GUY
BA Design for Art Direction, LCC
The Body in Pain, 2024
Digital print
The housing crisis is in a detrimental state. Through my work volunteering for Shelter, a homeless charity, and my own lived experiences, I have seen the widespread effect of issues with public and private housing. I have understood first-hand how they can affect your mental and physical health. I want my work to bring awareness and start a conversation in regard to the housing crisis so we can begin working together to end the housing emergency forever.
My two publication spreads respond to the idea of comfort, and how discomfort can be caused through an inadequate housing provision in the private rental market. This work is inspired by my experience with private renting in first year where I had a neglectful landlord, resulting in my ceiling eventually falling down in my bathroom. My experience, although it seems extreme, is mild in comparison to a lot of households across the UK and I think it is important that we recognise these issues so we can change them instead of sweeping them under the rug.
Artist Bio
A designer and strategist focused on utilising the power of visual communication to mobilise change. My practice focuses on working with businesses/individuals who want to make a positive impact in this world through publication design, advertising design and brand strategy.
HANJUN SHI
MA Games Design Graduate, LCC
Rent, 2023
2D Computer Game
I tried to explore the nowadays British life in the Stardew-Valley style game, telling how an ordinary person tries to earn enough money to survive and pay the rent. This 2D top-down pixel narrative and puzzle game based on my personal experience in London for the previous year, hopes to recreate the hardship and difficulties both immigrants and locals face in present Britain. In this game, I try to create a safe and comfortable playing environment, so players can feel the rental life in an ideal environment, rather than the reality of struggling with money.
Since 2021, the combination of Covid and armed conflict has led to a significant increase in the cost-of-living problem in the UK, resulting in growing pressure on ordinary people. Facing expensive rent fees, many people have no choice but to reduce their daily costs to pay the rent fee. Those bitter experiences gave me a strong idea to reflect them in a game. Deriving inspiration from Russian author Yevgeny Zamyatin, ‘Instead of lamenting bitterly in the face of everyday suffering, we should learn to laugh at it.’
Artist Bio
I am a lucky kitten lover who lived in a community with twenty-one adorable cats, and a game designer focused on using entertainment to reflect modern-day issues. With a background in game design and medieval history, I am advancing my academic pursuits and game design career.
JADE NICKLIN
BA Illustration with Creative Computing, Camberwell
Untitled, 2024
Wallfiller, peeled paint
Jade is a BA Illustration graduate from Camberwell College of Arts, specialising in Ceramics. She is interested in community projects, arts education and accessibility.
Artist Bio
JIAYU LIAING
BA Fine Art Drawing, Camberwell
People’s Favourite Items, 2024
Mixed media
I asked a few people who lived in London for their favourite items in their current residence, I then made those items into cotton toys and sold them. Selling people’s favourite items in their accommodation for 10 pounds, the mismatch between labour and income is like the gap between ideals and reality. Accommodation is a concept close to home, but what makes a home? Those toys are a tangible manifestation of the tenants’ found memories and private lives and are sold cheaply on the market. The beautiful, pink, utopian shop was constructing a refuge, hiding the reality.
As a Chinese artist now living in London, my interest in housing is deeply rooted in the cultural belief that a home requires a house. Upon moving to London last September, I was struck by the high costs of rent and utilities, realising that housing affordability is a collective rather than a personal issue. Many students, including myself, made huge compromises to manage housing costs. I tried to escape the tough renting problem by discussing private details and interests, blending personal desires with societal issues in housing.
Artist Bio
My art develops through the connection of people, and there is no clear identification of the artist and the viewer. I always imagine utopian futures in children’s minds, and the beautiful colours are the best expression of that.
JUNDAI LIN
BA Textiles Design Graduate, Chelsea College of Art
DRIFTING, 2023
Deconstructed furniture
DRIFTING is a multifaceted art practice that engages the spectator by using deconstructed furniture pieces, weaving themselves into everyday life. The focus was to reshape the imaginations of urban space, using everyday objects to visually, politically and socially re-define urban space.
This project is a response to the space and surroundings of where I live in London, and is inspired by Situationist arts and urban derive. The work brings together the idea of renaturing/reshaping the urban street space. Following intuition, it seeks to adjust everyday life and attempts to alter the regular rules.
Artist Bio
Jundai Lin is a multidisciplinary artist originally from China, and currently based in London. Her practice includes space, psychology, Situationist Arts, and textile design. Her body of work ranges from daily performances to sculptures.
Inspired by urban space, everyday life and random objects, Lin uses abstract expressionism to explore the relationship between spectator and urban environment. Playful and joyful furniture methods are the core of her practice.
KIRSTEN TINGLE
MA Biodesign, CSM
Landlords Hate Art, 2023
Watercolour on yupo plastic
The artwork is a figurative watercolour that was destroyed when my studio flooded in 2023. The flooding was from burst pipes in the ceiling which led to a cascade of gallons of water into my studio from the ceiling. The pouring water forced me to race to move as many of my paintings from the studio as possible during the 20 minute deluge. The building was privately rented and horrifically maintained by a landlord who had been frequently taken to court for not maintaining habitable conditions in many of the buildings he owned and rented. The piece, retitled Landlords Hate Art, evidences how the landlord class destroy and damage art through the poor maintenance of the buildings they rent. The work will be accompanied by a photo of the original pre-damaged work, and a video of the caved in ceiling pouring water into the studio.
Artist Bio
Kirsten Tingle is a Scottish artist currently based between London and New York City. She holds a BA in Art and English from Pomona College in South California and completed a four-year certificate program in painting and sculpture at The Art Students League of New York. Kirsten is currently completing her MA in Biodesign at Central Saint Martins.
Her latest body of work combines art and science techniques to convey the severity of climate change to the public. She maintains a daily painting practice which frequently returns to self-portraiture.
LAURA GAGGERO & MARTA MONTAÑA GÓMEZ
BA Photojournalism & Documentary Photography, LCC
Portraits of London’s Rent Crisis, 2023
Photography, text
With incomes that a few years back would have granted a comfortable life, renters in London are now forced to move out and pay at least one third of their wages for a room in a shared house, move further out of London, or even leave the UK. Despite initial falls during COVID-19, average rents have now surpassed pre-pandemic levels, making rental affordability the worst in over a decade.
People born outside the UK make up 38% of London, the worst affected area by the cost-ofliving crisis. This collaborative project takes a look at some of these migrants who came here before COVID-19 to study and work and whose mental health and economic stability have been overlooked and shaken mercilessly. With this project, we aim to amp up the conversation and call for collective action towards a more equitable and welcoming city.
Artist Bios
Laura Gaggero is an Italian photographer and visual artist based in London. She graduated in Photojournalism and Documentary Photography from the University of the Arts London (LCC) in 2021. She now works as a freelance photographer and photojournalist, often focusing her practice on social issues and inequality.
Marta Montaña is a Spanish photographer based in London. She graduated with a BA in Photojournalism and Documentary Photography at UAL in 2021 and is now a picture editor for the Wider Image at Reuters, and a freelance photojournalist covering news and social issues in both Spain and London.
MAISIE RIDPATH
BA Fine Art, CSM
Relaxing Consequences, 2024
Site-specific work
The following photographs serve as documentation of new housing developments currently in construction around London. The opposing words mirror the hypocrisy of gentrification hidden behind the guise of something ‘new and exciting.’
Every day we walk, cycle, drive past temporary construction walls emblazoned with phrases suggesting happier futures and a slick new sense of community. Why is it that new is better than improved? That we must demolish in order to create? The controversial act of graffitiing also plays into how we question the art space and its accessibility. How we encounter work, although important to consider, should not play into its merit.
I am passionate about exploring the intersections between society, capitalism, and institutional critique through branding and colour. I thrive on sparking conversation between the ‘art’ world and the ‘real’ world and what we consider art to be in commercial vs public spaces.
Artist Bio
NGAI NING YU
BA Fine Art Painting, Camberwell
Glimpse 01; Glimpse 02; If only I knew; You just came in, 2024 Oil on canvas
In her latest series of paintings exploring the concept of ‘The Home’, Ngai Ning Yu works from photographs and memories of the places she has inhabited. She portrays the emptiness of home interiors and investigates a sense of temporality as it relates to the idea of living in a rented, hence borrowed space.
In the absence of human intervention, all that remains are fragments of presence ingrained into the space as evidence of what once was. ‘My mother’s nightgown hangs on the back of a door; a basket of towels is reflected in the shower glass.’ Lingering shadows suggestive of human presence interrupt the sameness of these spaces, which are also complimented by the ephemeral representation of light. The relatability of this solitary experience is accentuated by the paintings’ archetypal resemblance to a space comfortingly familiar, leaving viewers to reside in their universal resonance with the shadows of past occurrences. As the paintings feel haunted by the shadows of its human tenants, the isolation of humans living in contemporary society can be explored.
Artist Bio
“My paintings verbalise the hidden images that can be triggered by certain sensory experiences. Despite the detachment that comes from accumulated lived experiences, certain triggers like the cast of light can bring me back to an impression of home.” This peculiar manifestation of imagery from an emotional response forms the beginning of Ngai Ning Yu’s creative process, and the grey area between memory and invention is where her paintings reside.
PETRICA BISTRAN
BA Painting Graduate, Camberwell
Flat Box Series (no. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5), 2023
No. 1: pencil on paper, No.2 - No.4: oil on paper, No.5: mixed media on paper
“Flat Box Series” originated during my time as a UAL student living in different private accommodations from 2019 to 2023. These paintings and drawings make use of flattened small boxes and cardboard packages, transforming them into representations of lived-in spaces, intimate environments, and small houses. They reflect the challenges of living in cramped quarters at inflated prices, capturing the feeling of being trapped while expressing the need to expand space through imagination.
My artworks delve into the theme of privately-rented space and its impact on students’ creative processes, storage limitations, and the creation of new artworks. By exploring how these confined living conditions influence creativity, I aim to evoke contemplation on the intricate relationship between living environments and artistic expression. The “Flat Box Series” prompts viewers to consider how space constraints can both hinder and inspire artistic endeavours, highlighting the resilience and adaptability of students. Through this exploration, my work seeks to spark a dialogue on the broader implications of housing issues, encouraging a deeper understanding of the connection between our surroundings and the art we create.
Artist Bio
I am a Romanian artist living in the UK. My artistic practice draws on themes of ecology and spirituality, exploring painting’s potential to reshape our relationship with nature. Through my work, I invite viewers to contemplate the intrinsic value of earthly existence, encouraging reflection on what is most significant to humanity.
SADIE LEE
MA Graphic Design, LCC
In the Shadow of Progress, 2024
Risograph
Prints
Drawing inspiration from the intricate nature of gentrification and urban rejuvenation, this artwork delves into the profound layers of frustration and resilience experienced by individuals facing redevelopment. Building on distinctive paintings that often explore unstableness and resilience within spaces often characterised by decay and desolation, these pieces incorporate graphic elements depicting the ongoing gentrification process in London’s Southwark area.
Central to the compositions are motifs of dilapidated spaces, abandoned furniture, and marginalized communities, which serve as visual metaphors for the profound attachment and resilience embedded within them despite the challenges they face.
Sadie Lee’s artistic practice often delves into the exploration of elasticity and resilience within decaying spaces, crafting surreal scenes. She incorporates graphic elements atop her distinctive paintings and illustrations, experimenting with printing techniques. Recently, she has delved into the intricate layers of gentrification in London.
Artist Bio
ZOE R. MURPHY
BA Fine Art Painting Graduate, Camberwell
23/23: So That I May See Oil on signature double canvas
I have to work in my bedroom and house a lot as I am an emerging artist at the start of my career and come from a working-class background. Not having the space, or funding, to have studio spaces means I have to turn my (tiny) bedroom, and my house’s garden into a workable space. I make large work a lot currently, and this poses a variety of challenges in trying to make space fair in a shared space.
This work itself has been recently held in my house’s hallway – unable to move around anywhere else because of its size, and has seemingly become part of the background of my shared living spaces. An interesting juxtaposition considering the work’s boldness. You can see damage on almost all of my work, including this one, from being bashed and moved into and around the small house. Some would re-stretch and re-frame their work – but I like the marks this work has been given by my house. I don’t think that relationship should be removed.
Zoe R. Murphy is an abstract painter based in South London. Her works experiment with a unique presentation style of using a diptych to present almost all works - the signature double canvas. In recent exhibits, Zoe R. Murphy has pushed the boundaries of her work, seeing how far she can push these painting ‘objects’ without losing their own forced boundaries - set by the artist herself.
Artist Bio
PROGRAMME
As part of the exhibition, there will be a series of free events and discussions by Arts SU staff and collaborators.
The Student Housing Crisis: What We Need From The General Election
Monday 10th June, 3-4pm
Hear from Sabbatical Officers, including our very own LCC Officer, the NUS, University Housing Advice and Generation Rent (the Renter’s Reform Coalition) on their experiences of the housing crisis, working with young people affected by it, lobbying the government and more. The panel will end with an open round table for the audience to join the discussion.
Coup de Cake x Housing Workshop
Wednesday 12th June, 2 - 4pm
Have you had issues with housing this year? Have you struggled to know what to do and how to act? Using artist, Honor Freeman’s, ‘Coup de cake’ technique, participants will gather to decorate cakes, listen and share their experience of housing. Led by Camberwell College Citizens, learn about local and London-wide housing campaigns that you could get involved in, and be a part of the change!
BE YOUR OWN LANDLORD
Thursday 13th June, 3 - 5pm
Renting from private landlords exists today as the least secure and poorest quality housing tenure. This has led to a growing number of Londoners looking to take control of their housing security, and in doing so, challenging the very idea of what it means to own a home. Housing Co-operatives and new models of Collective Ownership are emerging with the aim of enabling people to come together, pool resources, and be their own landlords. Join Levent Kerimol from Community led housing London for examples of how renters have taken control, and how you can do it too.
Fight for Home: A Shelter Meet and Greet
Friday 14th June, 12pm - 5pm (Talks happening at 1pm)
Join Shelter to chat about the rental crisis and your housing rights. A representative from Shelter will begin with a short talk introducing Shelter’s mission and ways you can get involved. There will also be an opportunity to talk about student’s rights in private renting, and to delve into Shelter’s manifesto. This is a great opportunity to learn how we can collectively fight for safe and secure homes for everyone.
RESOURCES
We have a room full of helpful resources for you to delve into as part of the exhibition, these can be found in the front room of the building by the entrance. Some of these include:
ARTS SU PRIVATE RENTERS REPORT // ARTS SU ADVICE SERVICES // ARTIST-LED HOUSING by Various Artists // AGAINST LANDLORDS BY NICK BANO // GENTRIFICATION IS INEVITABLE & OTHER LIES BY LESLIE KERN // GOT DAMP BY AVRIL CORROON // HOME IS NOT A PLACE BY SIMAN XU // LONDON RENTERS UNION RESOURCES // MOVING BY SUMMER OXLEY // REALTY: BEYOND THE TRADITIONAL BLUEPRINTS OF ART & GENTRIFICATION
Edited by
Tirdad Zolghadr
// SHELTER MANIFESTO //
We would firstly like to thank all of the artists for their generous contributions to this exhibition. Each artist has engaged with the themes in a unique way, encouraging audiences to witness some of the apalling realities of renting in London, and offering ways of imagining otherwise. Thank you to all of the artists who submitted work through the open call.
We would like to thank the Arts SU Staff, Student Staff and Sabbatical Officers for their support, commitment and engagement in making this exhibition a reality.
We would like to thank our selection panel, for their consideration in choosing the selected artists. We would like to thank the Arts SU Comms team for their work on promoting the exhibition.
We would finally like to thank our external collaborators including Maverick Projects, for providing the exhibition space, and NUS, Generation Rent, Camberwell College Citizens, Community-Led Housing London & Shelter, for their contributions to the events programme.
Artists
Arin He, Beth Webster, Charlotte Guy, Hanjun Shi, Jade Nicklin, Jiayu Liaing, Jundai Lin, Kirsten Tingle, Laura Gaggero & Marta Montaña Gómez, Maisie Ridpath, Ngai Ning Yu, Petrica Bistran, Sadie Lee & Zoe R. Murphy.
Selection Panel
Calum Sherwood, Senior Policy & Research Officer, Arts SU
Avril Corroon, Freelance Artist
Aisling Ward, Exhibitions Coordinator, Arts SU
Arts SU Private Renters Report
Written by Calum Sherwood
Curation: Arts Programme Team
Led by Aisling Ward, Exhibitions Coordinator
Supported by Katie Hughes, Arts Programme Manager, Lotte Dawson, Arts Programmer, Bea Taylor-Searle, Arts Programmer
Events Programme
Sophia Nasif-Whitestone, LCC Officer Arts SU Advice Team
NUS University Housing Advice Generation Rent
Camberwell College Citizens Community-Led Housing London Shelter
