Summary
This series is based on turning up to meet myself in my studio and observing changes in mood, appearance and aesthetics over a year in flux. The portraits are designed to be part of a wider narrative on subjectivity and the impossibility of defining the self in the singular.
Talk to Me – A Dialogue with Self-Portraiture
My series explores self-portraiture as a fluid and mutable study of self. Turning up to sit repeatedly, I observe changes in mood, appearance and aesthetics. The portraits are designed to be viewed as a series and form part of a wider narrative on subjectivity and the impossibility of capturing the self as singular. Drawing on the writing of Virginia Woolf as inspiration to explore the archaeology of their unstable identity, exploring notions of self through portraiture and visual memoir. Working predominantly in oils, an experimental visual shorthand is being developed and refined that utilises painterly techniques of layering and erasure to reveal and disguise aspects of self. In the language of psychoanalysis, this painterly research uses the methods of mirroring, repetition and rupture to disrupt and reintegrate personal narratives. Collectively, these self-portraits illuminate multiple iconoclastic identities, creating a visual vocabulary that communicates affective states of transformation and becoming. Another critical method of the research is the creation of large-scale mixed-media narrative works that appropriate the literary tradition of memoir. These works centre on relationships and their role in shaping and reshaping our perceptions of self from childhood. Inspired by figurative painters such as Joan Semmell and Jenny Saville, as well as the performance-based narrative works of photographers Sophie Calle and Cindy Sherman. By working through the artefacts of self, this research aims to simulate a new site for healing and connection.