Trojan Horses explores how images can hold and carry meanings that are not immediately visible. Taking its cue from a text by Andrew Cranston, the exhibition considers how aesthetics can act as a point of entry into complex and often uncomfortable subjects.

Bringing together twelve artists working across painting and drawing, the exhibition is co-curated by SET studio members Tom Houlihan and Elisa Terranera, and is presented at SET Vauxhall.

About the exhibition

“Beauty can be a useful Trojan horse to smuggle in darker ideas”, writes Andrew Cranston in his book Never a Joiner. He is reflecting on his painting Vague feelings of dread (2022), where a small group of fish hover above the pearlescent tiled floor of a pond. For Cranston, their subtle, shifting movement recalls submarines and warships in the Mediterranean, becoming a way of expressing unease shaped by conflict and its ongoing presence.

Trojan Horses takes this idea as its starting point. Bringing together painting and drawing, the exhibition asks how artists use aesthetics to engage with social and political realities.

Across the exhibition, the works touch on themes including class, feminism, war, mortality, identity and religion. Here, beauty is not simply decorative or resolved; it operates as a point of entry – something that draws viewers in before revealing more layered and challenging ideas beneath the surface. Or, as Cranston puts it, “darker ideas”.

All twelve artists share a background in observational drawing. At a time marked by political and technological uncertainty, Trojan Horses reflects on what this longstanding language of picture-making can still hold, and how painting and drawing continue to offer ways of engaging closely with the world today.

Event details

Opening: Thursday 9 April, 6-9pm
Dates: 9-26 April
Opening hours: Thursday – Sunday, 12-6pm
Location: SET Vauxhall, Camelford House, 89 Albert Embankment, London
Admission: Free

The exhibition is also viewable by appointment. Please contact: tomhoulihan7@gmail.com

Contributing artists

Sasha Alfillé, Joe Allen, Rebecca Ashton, Arthur Boothby, Lucy-Bruce Gardner, Bruno Diaz, Bart, Hajduk, Thomas Houlihan, Jack McGarrity, Keziah Mornin, Elisa Terrenera, and Dylan Williams

About SET’s Associate Members Programme

This exhibition is presented as part of SET’s Associate Members Programme, which offers artists studio space alongside access to project spaces and opportunities to independently curate exhibitions, workshops, and events.

The programme supports a wide range of practices, from performance and installation to music, sound, print, and textiles, and is designed to provide space, visibility, and development opportunities for early-career and underrepresented artists working in London.

Poster image: Elisa Terranera (@elisaterranera)