Five artists working in different mediums are having a joint exhibition at the City Hall Arts Centre tomorrow night.

The artists in the Group of Five 2004 exhibition are Peter Lapsley, gallery director of The Bermuda Society of Arts, Kok Wan Lee, Julie Hastings-Smith, Daniel (Bence) Benson and Sue Grass.

Mr. Lapsley said this series of work is all new having been done in the past year and is mostly ink, acrylic and charcoal on paper with one piece being charcoal acrylic and ink on canvas.

He said: ?I have been working on figurative subject matter for some time now, but usually based in realism.

?Mostly large canvases and nude figures. This series however is a paring down of the figurative work into a series of silhouettes of people.

?These I have then been layering and placing in various ways until they make sense to me. I don?t want to be vague about my intent with them, but their meaning is really in the eye of the beholder.

?I had thoughts about people and their relationships with one another when I initially began the series last year, but it has evolved since then, and if someone were to ask me I would say I am exploring this subject and following it wherever it wants to go.?

Malaysian born Kok Wan Lee, who mainly specialises in abstract landscapes, said his plan is to convey his message by using simplification, abstraction, colour and texture in places where logic would say they don?t belong. ?It is basically 18 pieces in different sizes and the whole process is a tree series, which is called ?blooming, breathing and growing?,? he said. ?So I have a tendency to do a series of work for my show and it is in pieces and a couple of them will be based on growing, blooming and breathing.

?My intention for this show is based on landscapes and as you know and most of my work is semi-abstract and you don?t expect that it is a local colour.

?Sometimes you can see a purple sky or a red sky, but not a blue sky and some part of the colours on the landscape you would not expect to see those colours and I am doing this so that it is the opposite way.

?I would more or less like to invite the viewer to investigate what is my whole process.?

Julie Hastings-Smith has been involved in the Bermuda art world since 1993, and she has been producing artwork for the past five years.

She said she currently shares studio space in Dockyard with Angela Gentleman and Suzie Lowe who work in similar mediums.

?It is mostly pieces based on the figure in bronze and ceramic bowls and pots,? she said. ?There will also be figurative sculptures.

?When we first moved out here, from England, I originally worked as curator in the Art Centre, in Dockyard. And then I began producing my own work when I left there. I became a full-time artist and I am very lucky to have the opportunity.?

Ms Hastings-Smith said she always had an interest in art, but had never produced any of her own work.

?But I never really had the opportunity to spend time on it,? she said. ?I originally started on a trip to Mexico with the artist Chesley Trott, and he was taking a class of juniors down to do bronzes and I joined them for the trip and ended up taking it up and keeping up with it.

?It is a lovely spot down there, it is a little colonial town and has a big art community.?

The painter Sue Grass said she is interested in exploring her visual experience of place.

?I?m also interested in how new imaging technologies impact that experience and the documentation of it,? she said.

And last, but not least Daniel ?Bence? Benson said he has a series of selective mix-media sketches exploring and highlighting the need for human understanding.

He said: ?As well as carrying its own visual ?aesthetic?, the goal of the work is to question the idea of what is art?s most important purpose or function??

The exhibition opens tomorrow at 5.30 p.m. until 7.30 p.m. at the City Hall Arts Centre. The show runs until September 15.