I have been super busy over the last 6 months. Not only do I work full time and study for my MA part time, but I also started doing amateur dramatics last autumn, in which I somehow managed to bag a lead role in their spring musical (Gabriella in High School Musical on Stage - I know, right?!). So as you can probably imagine, I’ve not managed to spare much time for keeping this blog up to date...
I’m currently sat underneath my work invigilating for our MA interim exhibition. The last few weeks have been a crazy whirlwind, frantically painting, writing, singing and dancing. Everything came to a head last week; my AP1 research portfolio deadline was Thurs 24 May, all exhibition work also needed to be hung by 4pm, and then Friday 25 May was High School Musical opening night. I’ve finally had some time to gather my thoughts and reflect on my working practice throughout the course so far.
I am generally pleased with this project’s outcome, but I don’t have any strong feelings about the work I’ve created. I suppose the perfectionist within me struggles with painting, which is why I never really pursued it as a kid and ended up falling in love with photography. I don’t think I am ever completely satisfied that I’ve painted something perfectly. I’m not even sure what my idea of perfectly is, which is something I should probably attempt to figure out over the next 18 months.
I’m not going to try and recite my creative thought process to you, I will just leave you with my artist statement which sits alongside my work within this exhibition:
‘Merging Media: Differing Depictions of Self
Self-portraiture has been a means of artistic and cathartic expression for me for a number of years now. What began as a simple matter of convenience (you try finding a model at 2am when an idea strikes and your camera starts talking) soon became a therapeutic necessity; a creative and expressive outlet for emotion and anxiety.
The images included in this series play with media and what is real. The photographs may at first appear fairly ordinary, but look closer. Why is she lying on the floor? How many fingers? Then, add to this uncomfortable uncertainty, the floating layer of paint; giving each image a whole new dimension, both physically and conceptually. I’m not fond of intrusively forcing narrative or constructing commentary, but to me these images are about questioning the underlying emotion; reconsidering potentially ambiguous motivation; looking for the consciousness hiding underneath the physical action.’
Acrylic on acetate in front of digital photographic print, A1 (594 x 841mm)
You can find the flat, digital versions of this over-painted images in the gallery section on this website.