Multistory is pleased to present Nothing Gold Can Stay, a group exhibition of newly commissioned work made during the second iteration of Assembly, a development programme for local artists held in partnership with The New Art Gallery Walsall. This year we have supported Mia Banks, Mandeep Dillon and Tegen Kimbley. Through process and the formal parameters of sculpture, moving image and photography, the artists consider the complex tensions between time, the production of images and the ethics of viewership, exploring how practices of slowness and deep attention ask us to view the world differently.
Mia Banks’ installation Reconfiguration builds on her ongoing critical spatial practice, which focuses on the abstraction and reinterpretation of everyday materials found in urban environments. Challenging the value of everyday objects, she replicates these often overlooked architectural elements as artworks, questioning what is seen and what remains invisible. The work invites dialogue around how the city is shaped and whose experiences are acknowledged within it.
Mandeep Dillon’s multidisciplinary practice draws on ecocriticism and animal theory, exploring the transient physicality of both human and more-than-human beings. Her series of works Gradually then suddenly places emphasis on materials which are fragile and subject to deterioration. The use of latex - made from the blood of the Hevea Brasiliensis rainforest tree - speaks of bodies and lands made vulnerable. Reacting to subtle environmental changes, their swollen buoyancy hints at a sense of imminent collapse.
Tegen Kimbley’s new moving image work and photographic series Whispering Reeds reflects on the relationship between her father and his boat. Incorporating her father’s photographs and VHS footage alongside her own, the film is an intergenerational collaborative process between the two. Shifting between Tegen’s gaze on her father and her father’s gaze on the boat, the film explores the intimacy of looking as a contemplative act, one that acknowledges the other’s existence with reverence.
Preview
Thursday 17 July, 6-8pm. Free, all welcome
Artist biographies
Mia Banks is a multidisciplinary artist from Walsall, specialising primarily in sculpture with elements of photography. She combines mass-manufacturing and handcrafting techniques to extract and replicate everyday textures, aiming to encourage audiences to pay closer attention to their surroundings by offering a neurodiverse perspective. She has shown work at 01902, Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery, Creative Art Showcase 24 and Stryx amongst others. She previously won the Bowater Prize For Excellence (2024) and the Gertrude Emily Griffin Prize (2023). She studied at Sandwell College, and went on to undertake her BA and MA degrees at the Birmingham School of Art, and is currently in the process of undertaking her PhD in Art and Design.
Mandeep Dillon was born in Tipton to immigrant parents who spent their working lives in local factories and foundries. This upbringing gave her a deep awareness of race, deprivation, and social justice — themes that have shaped her life and career. She completed a BA at Trent Polytechnic and went on to work as a documentary filmmaker in regions affected by conflict and natural disasters. In 2019, she earned an MA in Sculpture from the Royal College of Art, where she received the Madame Tussauds Fine Art Prize. She has since been shortlisted for the Ingram Prize, exhibited widely, and undertaken several residencies, including a year-long programme at Buckinghamshire New University.
Tegen Kimbley is a documentary photographer based in the Black Country. She graduated from The University of South Wales in 2018. Recent group exhibitions include Surreal Solihull (2025), PRISM Photography Open 2025, Midlands Arts Centre (2025), Narcissus in Bloom, Ffoto Cymru 2024, CYCLES, The Gap (2024), The Technician Show, hmv Empire (2022), Offsite 9: Wolverhampton Outdoor Market (2022). Exploring manmade environments Tegen documents the people and objects that inhabit them, creating narratives around the everyday and over-looked. Through considered composition, she attempts to generate dialogue around current environmental, social and economic issues, whilst creating a sense of atmosphere and place.