METAPHOR
2019
In this module I wanted to focus on creating an art metaphor to represent the proletariat in a capitalist society. As someone who has left full-time work to return to education, I often find myself missing the ‘freedom’ which comes with having spare money to ‘consume’, yet not missing the ‘time’ felt wasted on what seems to be pointless work. Life on the breadline is a struggle in which some people will do anything to find the light, while for others it’s an impossibly gloomy world. I explored repetitive processes in order to replicate mundane work carried out by the masses, but also to better understand the workplace before technology took over, when people were more valuable to society. In doing this, I found a connection to the natural world's rhythm and motion in the yarn which I used to knit and weave. Alan Watts' lectures about Eastern culture, as well as Sheila Hicks' textured weaves, were massive sources of inspiration for this project, and have helped me to take a more calm approach to daily life.
Below you can see a selection of images of works in progress as well as completed pieces.
Exhibition display of 352.40 YLW and 330.40 BLK
40-hour knitting project
330.40 BLK on the loom
Sample weave which inspired 330.40 BLK
Experimenting with shapes
352.40 YLW
Textured black weave which inspired 330.40 BLK
Close-up of 352.40 YLW
Sample weave using wrapped weft
Slab of knitting
BOUNDARIES
2018-19
For this project I decided to focus on the boundaries which everybody encounters: life and death. Bill Viola gave me the idea of incorporating family into my work, as his Nantes Triptych was based upon the birth of his son, but also had footage of his mother in her last days before passing. The idea that something so personal could have such an effect on the viewer is what struck me the most. I had also been reading a book by Julian Barnes which was an extract from Nothing to be Frightened of: a collection of stories of the inevitable death, and memoirs of the Barnes family. Using the textiles room as my main base, I started to experiment with freehand machine embroidery on different fabrics and discovered the hot-press, which I used to create small family napkins of my matriarchal line. This then led to me writing memoirs and printing family photographs on a large linen scroll for the exhibition. Something which I have always enjoyed about embroidery and textiles is the traditional idea that it is a female craft, which means it still symbolises a feminist approach when brought into the fine arts.
Exhibition display
Close-up
Close-up WIP
WIP
Stitching sample on satin
Stitching sample on voile
Stitching sample on blue voile
Sample close-up
Photographs on vintage napkins
Letterpress and photograph on napkin
Jars of perishables
What is Beauty?
For the piece below, I chose to use film, and to document myself undergoing a ‘standard’ beauty routine. This is something most of the women I know, and some of the men, adhere to: shaving ‘unwanted’ body hair on the legs and armpits, plucking eyebrows to a better shape, and applying make-up. When shooting, I decided to zoom in on the specific areas undergoing the ‘makeover’, so that the images were assertive, and almost brash.
After at least eighteen months of very little personal grooming, the shaving (of my armpits especially) felt intrusive and uncomfortable for me, I wanted this to be obvious to the viewer. The lighting was also very important, so I had every light in my flat pointed directly at my face during the filming process. My eyes were welled up the entire time, and even more so when I had applied thick layers of mascara to my lashes, and perfumed foundation to my cheeks. It gave the final film a sombre feel, especially with the addition of a piece of music by Kai Engle, fittingly called “Realness”.
The overall style of the film was based on works from two of my favourite artists; Andy Warhol, who was a very private person that created an artistic ego to portray himself in the public eye, often hiding behind his many muses and putting forward their ideas to make incredible and very famous works of art; and Tracey Emin who is a very open person, so much so that her works can often inflict painful emotions upon the viewers, whilst they re-live her past experiences either in her context, or their own.
