In the months leading up to the pandemic, poet and illustrator Peony Gent walked around King’s Cross. In sketchbooks she noted traces of its industrial history while recording fleeting moments of the present - friends meeting in Coal Drops Yard, shopkeepers at work in Caledonian Road and the flow of commuters.

In Overlay, Gent presented a series of works based on her observations. Her illustrations and poems combined her own responses to King’s Cross with the memories of people who have lived and worked there over the years. She created comics recording memorable encounters: a poignant chance conversation with a piano player at St Pancras station, and memories of a hot afternoon on Crofter’s Way.

To Gent, these everyday moments are the latest layer of King’s Cross’ history. Overlay was “a snapshot of my own point of view, a kind of frozen reflection on the many interlocking experiences that collect together to form a place.”

Exhibited as part of The Outside Art Project.

Selected press:

“Peony approached the project with open ears and eyes, waiting for small quotidian occurrences to strike emotionally”
It's Nice That

“Gent is a prolific storyteller...”
Stylist

“Peony Gent is not simply an artist pushing the form in intriguing and experimental ways but one who is genuinely taking comics into entirely new territory.”
Broken Frontier

Generously supported by the Barbara and Philip Denny Trust

All artworks © Peony Gent
All photographs © Brendan Bell