Hunted Projects is pleased to present A Banquet for Charles, a solo exhibition by Edinburgh-based artist Jonathan Freemantle (b. 1978).

A Banquet for Charles brings together a series of new still life paintings conceived as an elegy to a life lived beautifully. The exhibition celebrates the legacy of painter Charles Hardaker - Freemantle’s mentor, teacher, and friend - through a series of paintings that meditate on devotion, perception, and gratitude.

The exhibition unfolds as a symbolic meal: a visual banquet composed of courses that honour moments, tastes, and conversations shared, both real and remembered. Each painting represents a stage in the meal - from oysters and fish, to cheese, dessert, and finally the quiet aftermath - each one a poetic offering that channels Hardaker’s spirit and Freemantle’s enduring affection. The works are grounded in the artist’s own meals and rituals of remembrance: a fish course of monkfish and cockles shared with his wife Anna after Hardaker’s passing; a cheese course inspired by Giorgio Morandi, an artist beloved by both teacher and student; a Tarte Tatin evoking Hardaker’s love for France and his French wife; and an image of the meal’s aftermath, painted from a memory of a joyful family gathering in Athens.

This series of paintings are all executed in oil on linen; these contemplative still life paintings are imbued with light and intimacy. Each image transforms the simple act of dining into a meditation on presence - the essence of being with another.

At the heart of A Banquet for Charles lies an exploration of stillness, seeing, and the sacred in the everyday. As Freemantle notes, “He taught me that everything may be unlocked by this kind of looking, when looking becomes Seeing.” Freemantle first met Hardaker as a teenager in Johannesburg, when he was selected to join a small group of international students at the newly founded St Oswald’s Academy of Art in the mid-1990s. Under Hardaker’s quiet and exacting guidance, he learned to “refine the looking and refine the looker” - a principle that continues to inform Freemantle’s work today.

Hardaker’s influence extended far beyond the studio. Based in London, he was known for his gentle humour, spiritual depth, and lifelong devotion to painting - embodying the discipline and grace of a true master. Even into his nineties, he painted daily, returning again and again to the same view or collection of humble objects, distilling simplicity into transcendence. On the wall of his Fulham studio were the words Silence. Stillness. Space. - the foundation of his teaching, and now, the quiet rhythm of Freemantle’s homage.

In A Banquet for Charles, Freemantle extends that legacy, offering paintings that are at once devotional and celebratory. They reflect the spiritual lineage between teacher and student, and the enduring belief that art can open a space where seeing becomes being - where life itself is transformed through attention.

“I feel certain that the measure of a great human is not defined by the space they fill or the mark they make, but rather the quality of their presence and the clarity of the space they leave behind.” A Banquet for Charles stands as both tribute and transmission - a banquet of light, memory, and gratitude - inviting viewers to share in the stillness, generosity, and grace that defined a master’s life and legacy.