Artist Statement

Over the course of my Fine Art degree, I have grown deeply fascinated by how oil paint behaves with other chemicals: effecting and altering how it interacts with surfaces. Instinctive mark-making leads my paintings, allowing imagined dystopian places and organic structures to form. Patriarchal anatomy that perpetuates gender inequality naturally influences my bitterness towards the male gaze. I begin to dissect these power struggles in my paintings by removing the sex completely. Using the penis as a symbol of power and destruction along with other motifs such as windows, mirrors, rooms, infants and fish.

I spend a lot of time watching. I watch screens, the world, my studio, my paintings, people, the walls. I’ve watched how people interact with women and the complicated social dynamics associated with it. I start with an initial gestural mark and then I come back to it and see if anything has appeared. A face? A limb? A building? I use solvent on a brush to start removing and carving into the painted surface and wiping away areas with rags to push the image further. Once I’ve established the foundations of the painting with this method, I build on it by blocking in areas of colours, negotiating positions and tensions between places and figures. I have recently moved to using small wooden boards primed with multiple sanded layers of acrylic primer. This intensive preparation allows glazes of oil paint to move fluidly and unpredictably across the surface.

My paintings can be seen in multiple configurations, together as multiples, individuals... I like to shuffle them around, rearranging them on the wall in grids that can then erratically disperse to allow for a continued developing narrative upon completion. 

Andrew Cranston particularly in how he responds to initial mark-making and use figures to build narrative in their work. His use of narrative is something I find deeply important in my own practice as well

I don’t know whether these imagined places in my paintings are built from scratch or if they’re a glimpse into how I see the world, how I view the patriarchy and associated expectations. I’ve always felt uncomfortable with how people jump to use the female figure. I think it should be more considered. I very intentionally try and keep the figures androgynous in nature. Erect penises help lean towards exposure, being captured at quite a vulnerable moment. 

Bitterness from a women perspective elaborate on the motifs and the core themes of my practice which is bitterness from a women perspective, patriarchy, motifs and symbols. 

I was raised to question and criticise. I don’t accept things for what they are just because that’s how it is, and has always been. I’ve begun to pour this eye for justice into my work. Pippa El-Khadi Brown investigates the home and how it is a direct influence on us and our lives, using this knowledge to play God within her paintings. I’ve been trying to navigate this need to dissect our internalised and projected biases. Lynette Yiadom-Boakye is interesting because she uses her memories to start building imagined people and situations, though they aren’t necessarily real, the moments they are portraying are real. Marlene Dumas is interesting because she is white but is still critical and questions white superiority and hierarchy with ears and eyes. She isn’t speaking for people but represents her own lived experiences as a white person, who grew up in apartheid Africa, experiencing two very different worlds. Taking inspiration from these women I am keen to encapsulate my bitter account as a woman and start dissecting that bitterness. What are the prohibitors stopping us, men and women, from experiencing the world in the same way? The patriarchy. Dismantling this is almost impossible when you recognize how truly engrained it is in us as humans. Everything is hierarchy What effect does this have? Using the penis to….