In Scorcher, The Egg & Dart’s summer compilation, Ruby Hoppen cuts and conflates visions of an Oz summer where we sink into mammalian habits. Rob Howe formally pares back an international cricketing incident to three crucial frames with elegantly restrained colour. Montana Miller’s wild at heart paintings unleash beasts both panicked and liberated. Frank Nowlan draws attention to the remarkable in the bright light of the everyday. Henry Jock Walker’s demon mermaids and decal text pieces interrupt nostalgic surf dreams with conceptual offerings. Paul Ryan’s blustery landscapes are unexpectedly burnished with airbrush pink. And Christopher Zanko carves red brick into sharp relief so you can just about feel the sun warming the surface.
A good summer compilation gave you what you wanted and then threw in some surprises – a confabulation of breakout hits and sweet ballad earworms, funk faves, three-minute confections and songwriter stalwarts. It would move you from sultry to maudlin, from sweat to swoon. In that summer interzone, the compilation needed to both reflect the year gone and look to the future.
-Melody Willis
