The female figures in these paintings by the Ethiopia-born, Tel Aviv-based artist Michal Worke exude a sense of calm and purpose. Even when they are dozing on the kitchen floor, they inhabit the pictorial space as confidently as any Velázquez Pope or Holbein monarch. Depicted in domestic settings we might all recognise from our own lives – you can sometimes even recognise particular items of Ikea furniture – and rendered in a deceptively naive style, these figures emit a personality that carries far beyond the canvases to which they are confined. The balcony-view landscapes and apparently prosaic still lifes of workaday ephemera featured in this exhibition, entitled Inner Views, are almost as impressive. Worke (b.1982) is one of the finest members of a generation of largely female figurative painters who have come to prominence in the past 15 years. She directly references the late Paula Rego in a number of paintings here; this comparison is not unfavourable. Prices on request. 26 Cork Street, London W1 (020-8125 4065). Until 7 September.
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