We human beings find it hard to leave surfaces alone. Over the centuries, we have painted, stitched, incised, etched, built, shaved and carved marks onto every kind of surface: our bodies, our textiles and building materials, the objects we manufacture, the earth itself, and our own skin.

What is this mark-making urge? Is it terrotorial or a sign of ownership? A way of proving that we exist? A kind of protest? Or a compulsion, something that we, with our tool-holding hands, simply can't help doing? But marks can also be accidental or incidental, a by-product of another activity - a skid mark on a road, a graze on a knee, a blood stain, or an ink blot - without significance unless someone constructs or deduces a meaning.

On the Surface at The Parlour in London in December 2008 and Surface! at the Oxfordshire Museum, Woodstock in April 2009 formed a two-part exploration of the covering, uncovering and discovering of marks on surfaces. The two exhibitions showed different work by the participating artists.