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Art and Audience

Artist Statement:

As a human being, one must eat too survive.You would think this was simple: A thoughtless process. Something wired into the brain, like moving. A flow of sustenance that connects the baby to the mother; the first sense of satisfaction comes from a belly full of milk. Perhaps, is this the problem? Food has always fulfilled an absurdly complex place in my life. A pivotal oscillator between a good week and a bad one. The work shown on this website is all about reclaiming the joy of food, despite this ongoing battle. I am relearning how to eat and rewiring behaviours deep rooted inside. Verbal communication doesn’t come naturally, finding ceramics has been helpful in formulating a language to talk about this relationship to food and grounding myself.

In the process of relearning, I want to strip away my complex ideas of food. Taking influences from childhood memories, the ceramics I make are deliberately very safe. These memories of baking have fuelled a joy of sensory experiences. In an exercise, used sometime in meditation, a raisin is placed in the hand. After intensively observing its surface and shape, it is slowly chewed. One is encouraged to penetrate themself with as much sensation as possible. To think of the texture, the flavour, to turn this tiny piece of fruit into something gigantic. In a way, this is similar to what I am trying to do with my art. Enveloping myself in the tactile feeling of the clay and through physical and visual observations to try and hone in on the detail of the food.

With garish colours and a clear over glazes, to make the sculptures shine, a feeling of the uncanny is almost present when looking at my ceramics. Furthermore, having an awareness of how powerful the illustrations in children's books can be, I am interested in making them easily accessible for all ages, especially children. I feel like there is a lack of space for young people to talk about issues with food perpetuating cycles of misuse. The cathartic, therapeutic nature of sculpting clay combined with its fragility makes it an apt metaphor for mental health and self-care. This could also be said for baking. When you change these materials through heat and turn them into something else, they become fragile.

Within the year, discovering the joy of interactive making has been fundamental to my practice. Food has always been a central part of my personal relationships. Meal times can feel like collective performances used as unspoken methods of affection. In some ways, it feels as if baking came more naturally to me than speaking and has become a sort of language. Through collective pieces such as the Banquet, Shared Meals and The Chip Party I have wanted to bring people together in order to used this language of food as space to play.

Proposal For Exhibition:

Photos Above are pulmonary sketches for Degree show.

Context and influences:

The V&A jewelly exhibit

Julie Bozzi's America Food Display

Looking at the influences shown above has made me interested in the idea of archiving. As the work is about reconfiguring a positive joyful relationship to food, this style of presenting felt apt. Transforming each ceramic piece of food into something worth celebrating. Almost as if they were precious jewels. As some of the work is also memory based, reflecting on the impact certain food had to me as a child, this documentary format felt appropriate. Although through exhibited work, I have found interactive pieces more effective, yet with the degree show I still wanted to display the ceramic pieces in this way. As we are coming to an ending felt right to end with this work of a archival reflection of the last three years.

Gallery Space:

Walk into dark room. In the centre of the room are two cases side by side. There are two spotlights shining down over each case lighting up the content inside them. The light should enforce the shine and colour of the object in the cases almost as it they were jewels.

Cases:

Made out of oak and with the help of technician construct two wood display frame. The frames would consist of a large sheets of oak with rims nailed arounds their edges, to create shallow boxes. The content would sit within these boxes. Their lids would have large sheets of glass framed in some more oak. The lids would be hinged onto the bottom lay of the boxes so the case could be opened. The cases would have legs nailed to them so they were raised off the ground and handles connected to the side. On each display case there would be labels. One would be label "Traded chips". The other would be called "comfort".

Case - "Traded Chips":

Within this case would be presented all the ceramic chips made for me, at the chip party, in exchange of a real chips. As shown in the picture above regimentally place side by side as if they had been archived. Next to each chip there would be a number. At the side of the case there would be a card with a list of the same numbers. Next to each number would be the name of the person who made each chip.

Case - "Comfort":

Within this case would be presented a selection of ceramic foods that I have made. The food would be based of the comfort foods of my childhood. The list of these ceramic food would be:

3 fried eggs

1 pile of spilled baked beans

6 individual baked beans

3 potato waffles

1 hotcross bun

1 cherry bakewell tart

3 pieces of toast

2 fish fingers

4 potato smelly faces

2 chicken drum sticks

1 dairylee dunker

Each ceramic piece would be numbered. At the side of the case would be a card with the same list of numbers. By each number would be the name of each ceramic food.

Extra Bit:

Co-op Academy North Manchester workshop day:

In January I went into in the the Academy and put on a workshop for primary school kids where I asked them to make their favourite foods out of modelling clay. This was really amazing experience and I was moved by their creativity and how involved they got. The pictures of the food they made is shown below.