I’m very grateful to have been awarded a ‘Visual Artists and Craft Makers Award’ (VACMA), to develop my art practice in 2021. Established by Creative Scotland, and in partnership with Renfrewshire Council, the VACMA support artists and craft makers in developing their practice through new work, skills or opportunities.
I began to consider the progression of my work a year or two ago. I was increasingly drawn to explore new materials and to think more deeply about what I wanted my work to say (I wrote about it in this article here). Since then I have been experimenting with paint, finding that compared to the textiles I was used to using this medium allowed me to produce work with much greater spontaneity and expression. The VACMA award has given me the opportunity of a dedicated period of time to further develop this progression. To learn more about the possibilities of paint through experimentation with different techniques and surfaces. To reflect on the work I’ve made in the last seven years, distill the fundamental elements and bring these into my paintings.
I started by going right back to the beginning of my art education, thinking about the artists and movements I had been taught about. My ‘official’ art history education was pretty much limited to the old masters, I will always remember having to write a very long and painful essay on Géricault‘s “Raft of the Medusa” at school. While of course I completely admire, appreciate and marvel at the work of these great artists, it just wasn’t my ‘thing’ really. At home however, I was introduced to Mackintosh, Modigliani, Clarice Cliff, Picasso and Mondrian. As a teenager these are the type of artists I got excited about, and ultimately what rooted my fascination and love for modern art and design. I spent some time researching them, reading about their practice, looking at their styles and comparing their similarities. I realised that the aesthetic quality I strive for in my own work has certainly been influenced by these artists.
Applying the same method of research, I reflected on my own body of work from 2013 until 2020, analysing my inspirations, aesthetic, themes and progression to pinpoint what excited me about the work I had made. I picked out a dozen pieces and wrote down what I enjoyed about the work and what I didn’t enjoy (or what it was that made me want to explore a different approach). From this exercise I was able to really focus in on the aspects of my practice that remain constant and important, regardless of medium. I learned that my fundamental inspirations; landscape, geology, maps and diagrams, remain the same and these will continue to drive my work. That the process and materials are just as important as the finished piece - where I used to cut and stitch tweed together, now the raw canvas stained with fluid paint can create the similar feel of a ‘made object’. What I found most interesting through this exercise was that most of the pieces I picked out were ones I had made which had a strong intention and meaning, something which went beyond the basic story of the landscape and spoke more deeply of connection and experience and this is what I want to bring to the forefront in my paintings. I have previously used the very specific features of a map or diagram to form the structure and composition of my work, staying true to the contours and bedrock of the physical landscape. What I have considered now is how to use the learning and experience of studying these features in a more expressive way. Abstracting line, form and colour found in topographical or geological maps and drawings, and using them alongside organic shapes to communicate a story of experience and connection to the landscape.
With more clarity in the motivations and narrative I want to communicate with my work, I then looked at the artists I am interested in and inspired by right now. I have started to delve into the abstract expressionists, with particular focus on the women artists such as Lee Krasner and Helen Frankenthaler (on this subject, I highly recommend the book ‘Ninth Street Women’ by Mary Gabriel). I revisited the work of Scottish artist Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, which I was introduced to at the Watermill Gallery where I had my first exhibition, Barbara Hepworth, Ben Nicholson and several others of the post-war abstract movement.
This research has lead me to a greater understanding of how the work I make fits into the art world as a whole, to make sense of and feel comfortable in the visual language I’m creating. A language of gentle restraint, economy of form, space, light and colour.
Following this period of experimentation and research, and with ongoing support from Renfrewshire Council’s Artists Development Programme, I am currently working on a whole new collection of paintings which I hope to share with you soon.
