Student News: Anna Pike
Congratulations to OCA Stage 3 Painting Student Anna Pike who has a Site Specific Installation in Wells Cathedral for 2026 Wells Art Contemporary. (October 10 to November 7)
My art practice explores transience, changing states and our relationships with the natural world. I am interested in the tension between beauty and aversion, presence and absence, and the natural process of life, death and decay. Through a combination of the representational and the abstract, my work explores the concept of Becoming as both a subject and as a way of working. I am interested in how meaning is affected by place and, through site-specific approaches, I explore how paintings and sculpture exist in dialogue with their surroundings. I am interested in what happens when artwork, context and place intersect and in creating spaces where visitors can make their own connections, interpretations and experiences.
Eternal Oak (Quercus aeterna) is a piece that has been specifically designed for Wells Cathedral responding to the Wells Art Contemporary 2026 theme ‘Time’. It comprises 851 gilded acorn caps nestled within a 2m long found piece of water-weathered oak.
The oak tree is known for its longevity. Each year the acorn caps nurture the next generation of acorns and then are discarded, their job done. I have taken these acorn caps, 1 for each year of the Cathedrals history, and gilded them with 24ct gold leaf. Placed within this piece of oak, they have a collective identity, honouring the entire lineage of people who built, sustained and passed down through the generations, their care of the Cathedral over the centuries.
The work is situated in the North Quire Aisle and catches the light from the stained-glass window from across the Cathedral in the South Quire Aisle. The acorn cap, humble and organic next to the gold, represents the normality by which most people live and pass on. Yet the reflective richness and the symbolism provided by the gold gives a preciousness to the collective memory of those forgotten by history.
Find out more about Anna's work:
Instagram: @annapikestudio
Website: www.annapikestudio.co.uk
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