Thursday, January 16, 2025

'Vitreous Enamel' by Dale Devereux Barker RE

Vitreous Enamel by Dale Devereux Barker

Walking along Cloister's Walk, in St Katharine Docks, you will discover a plethora of bright panels fixed into the arches that separate Cloister's Walk from St Katharine's Way.

Cloister's Walk

There are one hundred and thirty five of these panels, with nine panels per arch.

Some of the designs are repeated, but sometimes with a different colour. However, each tells a story.

Keilyn with the Vitreous Enamel Panels

Dale Devereux Barker RE was commissioned for this project by Taylor Woodrow Properties, back in 1998. 

The architect Michael Manser CBE RA PPRIBA RWA, who had been president of the Royal Institute of British Architects from 1983-85, unveiled the panels on October 29, 1998.

Dock Life Panel

Of the work Dale said: 

"In creating these enamel panels for Cloister's Walk, I aimed to reflect and celebrate the many personalities that the Docks possess and positively contribute to its continuing evolution."

Contrasting with the brutalist architecture of the Tower Hotel, these panels bring this dark corner of the Docks to life.

Vitreous Enamel by Dale Devereux Barker

Short Biography

Dale Devereux Barker makes art out of all sorts of things, out of pictures, out of works, out of humour, out of frustration, out of sex, out of sitting on the beach. 

Since graduating from the Slade in 1986 he has developed a pictorial language which is distinctive in its combination of figurative imagery and complex layering of more abstract planes and textures scavenged from outside sources.

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