Current
24.2 – 10.3 2026
Serpil Mavi Üstün:Nothing Left Behind
3-5 Swallow Street Project Space
Huxley-Parlour are delighted to announce Nothing Left Behind, an exhibition by London-based artist, Serpil Mavi Üstün. Presenting a suite of thirteen new works on canvas, the exhibition reveals the artist’s sustained engagement with the quotidian, internal logics, and melodrama.
Mavi Üstün’s paintings offer glimpses: the drooped heads of tulips rather than the full bouquet, concealed faces masked behind books and drapery. This act of withholding infuses Mavi Üstün’s works with a tension, creating psychologically charged paintings that revel in the peculiarity of everyday moments. Closely-cropped compositions conceal contextual signifiers, yet plates, vases, beds, and ceramic figurines point to domesticity. Titles such as I’ll Be Waiting at the Door and The Waiting Room suggest worlds beyond the canvas’ limits. In this way, Mavi Üstün’s subjects exist in a liminality between public and private. Ambiguity operates as a mechanism for dialectical enquiry, to explore desire and solitude, vulnerability and assertiveness, and exteriority and interiority.
A performativity weaves through the artist’s practice. Depicting unresolved moments – where glossed fingernails and rouged lips spar with introverted gazes, and the textural, visceral qualities of fur and hair juxtapose with smooth painterly surfaces – Mavi Üstün’s vignettes are activated through an exchange with the viewer. Employing natural and non-human forms, such as cut fruits and dogs, as allegorical foils for her subjects’ internal expressions, the artist denies a single element agency over another, to create paintings laden with narrative potential.
The Studio
[HP] Describe where you produce your work, and why you chose that space. [SMU] I work in a light, calm studio where I can control the pace of the day. I chose this space because it allows for stillness. My work needs time, pauses, and room for things to feel unresolved.
[HP] What is the first thing you do in the morning. [SMU] I make coffee and sit quietly for a few minutes. I like starting the day without immediately producing anything. It helps me notice how I’m feeling before I enter the work.
[HP] If you could choose one word to describe your work, what would it be. [SMU] Suspended.
[HP] Where do you go to feel energised creatively. [SMU] Often it’s not a place but a moment. Watching a film scene, noticing a small gesture, or observing an everyday situation can be enough to trigger something.
The Works
13
Serpil Mavi Üstün
Innocent Desire
2026
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
Nothing Left Behind
2025
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
Faux Leopard
2026
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
The Waiting Room
2026
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
I’ll be Waiting at the Door
2026
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
Iris Portrait
2025
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
One and a Half Figs
2025
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
Perseverance
2026
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
The Hour Before
2026
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
Notes From The Studio
2026
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
Peach
2026
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
Pigeon
2025
Oil on canvas
Serpil Mavi Üstün
Flowing
2026
Oil on canvas
The Exhibition
9
B. Turkey1979
Biography
Serpil Mavi Üstün’s paintings explore the quiet personal dramas of contemporary life, transforming ordinary moments into intimate studies of emotional and psychological complexities. Her subjects, often women absorbed in their everyday routines or represented through familiar personal objects, embody the fragile balance between vulnerability and quiet defiance. Picturesque moments that initially suggest comfort or pleasure are subtly disrupted by gestures of indifference, revealing contradictions between composed outward appearances and interior psychological states. Within these seemingly ideal situations, figures appear to take an ambiguous pleasure in unsettling their own worlds, reflecting the personal conflicts entrenched in the quotidian of everyday life. These unresolved moments invite viewers to question what has just occurred and what might follow, opening up a contemplative space that reflects the nuances, ambiguities, and solitude of modern existence.
Mavi Üstün was born in Turkey in 1979. She studied at Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, Istanbul, and was shortlisted for the Royal Arts Prize in 2018. She has exhibited in both solo and group exhibitions in Istanbul, London, Paris, Dubai, New York, and Ankara. Her work has also been featured in Art Maze Mag, Istanbul Art News, and Maake Mag. Mavi Üstün currently lives and works in London.
Serpil Mavi Üstün:Nothing Left Behind
24.2 - 10.3.2026
Current
Hours
Monday to Friday, 10:00am - 5:30pm
Gallery
3-5 Swallow Street, Project Space
London
W1B 4DE