I first wrote about Oliver Jeffers here. A teller of fantastical children’s stories that are sweet and funny and with the most beautiful illustrations, Oliver Jeffers is also a figurative painter. His first London exhibition Nothing To See Here is at Lazarides Gallery in London opening tomorrow.

There is more than a touch of surrealism about his work, which also references familiar 18th and 19th century European landscape and still-life painting. Clearly an observer of modern life, the works question and provoke. The series of paintings which give the show its name show a classic rural landscape, or a reclining nude, defaced with the graffiti-like slogan Nothing To See Here, creating a tension between the picture and the words – which one is to be believed?

Oliver Jeffers’ world is an inquisitive one:

‘In contradicting modern scenes and subjects with references to classical painting, his depictions encourage the viewer to look a little closer at the world around them and question the mundane. Are we blindly ignorant or are our eyes wide open in the dark?’  

Oliver Jeffers: Nothing To See Here 13th September to 3rd October 2013 Lazarides Rathbone, 11 Rathbone Place, London. All images courtesy of the gallery.

More Oliver Jeffers: www.oliverjeffers.com

More in the gallery, here