Jack Penny : Old Country

This summer, Penny developed Old Country – a new body of work created during his residency at Elveden Hall – that responds to the complex atmosphere of Elveden: a place shaped by empire, reinvention, and inherited tradition.

Penny’s practice is driven by a fascination with tribal instinct. He sees human behaviour as governed by primal urges – status, territory, belonging – masked by civility. His paintings are alive with tension, humour, and coded rebellion. Figures wrestle, withdraw, misstep, and defy; they seem both part of and apart from the systems they inhabit.

There is mischief in every mark. Penny’s work refuses solemnity, leaning instead into irony and provocation. His paintings hold a mirror to the absurdities of social performance, where jokes and power plays blur.

Old Country is both homage and disruption – an exploration of what it means to belong in spaces heavy with history. Drawing on British mythology and national memory, Penny’s paintings ask: Who claims tradition, and who is left out? What rituals endure, and what gets rewritten?

 Artist-in-Residence Programme | HeritageXplore x The Dot Project