Tell us a bit about yourself and your work.
I would describe myself as a multi-disciplinary artist working mainly with printmaking. I work from a small studio space at home. I’m currently venturing into site-responsive work, and creating in situ.
I've always been interested in printmaking, but never achieved much success with it until I started collaborating with other printmakers – initially through Sketchbook Circle! Printmaking seems to capture atmosphere and sense of place so eloquently – and I love the element of serendipity in each print. I’m also drawn to the practical handling of materials and tools which is implicit in the process – making plates, using tools and readily accessible DIY materials..
how would you describe your work?
Eclectic! I’m a process artist, so I tend to follow ideas which emerge through the process of making and engagement with materials. I love things which are hand made and low-tech, embracing serendipity, thinking through making, using tools and processes. I love to use recycled materials and found surfaces and textures in my work, and I’m interested in fragility, temporality, and relationships to events – as opposed to dominant discourses of permanence and value in works of art.
Where do you get inspiration from?
I’m inspired by unusual and overlooked spaces, surfaces and textures, and discarded found materials. I use a lot of recycled packaging and cheap DIY materials in my work, and I find that engagement with the materials suggests new ideas and directions, making explicit thought processes.
What is the first thing you remember making?
I remember my brother and I making stuff when we were younger – we made stables for my Sindy horse, model tie-fighters inspired by Star Wars. My mum taught me how to use a sewing machine and make clothes when I was still quite young. I think this legacy has informed my practice as an adult, re-using and making things.
Being a hard-up single mum has made me use what I have creatively to upcycle and re-use things – altering and upcycling clothes, making stuff for the garden, making soft furnishings for our home (although it’s usually my mum who does these bits for me as I am a very impatient sewer!) . Being creative is central to the way that I live my life, and I think you can express yourself creatively in infinite ways.
What are you working on at the moment?
I’m currently making some prints inspired by Coventry Market. I usually make abstract monoprints, so this is an interesting avenue for me, I’m using drawing to help me think through my ideas & work out what aspects of the subject interest me, and trying to focus on and simplify those elements in my printmaking whilst retaining my abstract, process-based approach.
I’m going to start putting the fragmented pieces of the prints together as a larger piece, and this will happen in the Sitting Rooms of Culture space in Coventry Market. I’m then hoping to move it to a new local exhibition and music venue at the Litten Tree Buildings, where I want to continue adding to it. I’m collaborating with my brother, who is a jazz/improv musician, on this project, and he is planning to play and record in the exhibition space too.
