As we prepare for this Thursday’s event, we’re spotlighting the expressive, synesthetic works on paper by Jake Andrew, shown in the photo above inside Serene, bringing its calmness to life.
Jake, a synesthetic musician and painter, experiences sound as colour, movement, and emotion. His paintings become recordings of internal states, visual translations of rhythm, atmosphere, and feeling.
These works sit beautifully within Serene’s tactile palette of limewash, timber, polished concrete, and terracotta. Their chromatic energy animates the home, shifting its atmosphere room by room.
Below, we share the story from one of the four paperworks featured in the installation.
“Does His Love Make Your Head Spin?” (2023)
(Installed in the reception room at Serene)
Created for the exhibition IN BLOOM, this piece marks a pivotal moment in Jake’s practice - the first time he consciously channelled a deeper emotional state into his work. Painted in response to Keaton Henson’s You Don’t Know How Lucky You Are, the work mirrors the emotional swell of the music: tender at first, then rising into tension, doubt, and revelation.
Visually, sweeping movements of magenta, violet, and crimson dominate, contrasted by luminous passages of lilac and rose. A sudden strike of turquoise cuts through the centre like a breath inside a storm. Bold strokes in burgundy and near-black add gravity; translucent layers introduce vulnerability.
The painting becomes a rare window into the inner landscape of the artist at the start of a new relationship — full of longing, hesitation, and emotional truth.
“The Here and Thereafter” (2023)
(Installed next to “Does His Love…” inside Serene)
This work continues the emotional narrative introduced in Does His Love…. If that painting captures the uncertainty of early love, The Here and Thereafter represents the moment that follows — the shift, the clarity, the acceptance that something has changed.
Deep magentas and crimsons return, but now they’re met with darker contrasts, surges of blue, and flashes of gold. A pale, almost ghostlike figure seems to emerge from the brushwork, caught between what was and what will be.
It is the exhale after the storm - not serene, but honest.
Jake sees this work and Does His Love… as two linked moments in time, ideally collected together.