University College Falmouth

The two paintings shown (top and bottom images) are those which have evolved from the collages I have been making. I much prefer the second painting, but I still feel like it’s not completely resolved. However, I’m pleased with the way I have painted it and I feel it shows that I have loosened up in my approach, helped by my use of large foam brushes. I decided to portray the railings in this way to give a sense of the “identity” of the lido and its relevance in contemporary society fading: it is a place which is becoming a non-place.

I also attempted to include small areas of more chromatic colour in this piece, something which I intend to continue experimenting with.

Last week I created lots more collages using some new photos, as well as some more of Tinside Lido. I have started to bring different types of markmaking into my work, including tracings and line drawings, and I’ve started to play around with layering more using vellum. I think this creates a really interesting effect, and I feel that it really conveys the idea of a barrier or disconnection between a non-place and its surroundings, or someone briefly passing through a space and only being able to take in a certain amount of visual information – the rest is closed off to them.

I think these collages work well on a small scale, and I’ve decided to start experimenting with this before moving on to another larger-scale painting. I intend to start painting them on some 20x20cm MDF, hopefully still using vellum to create layers, and see how this compares to my previous work.

I’ve recently been creating collages of photos I’ve taken, mainly of Tinside Lido but also of other non-places. I’ve found that collaging the photos and then painting over the top of them can create some really interesting effects, and this approach has also really helped me loosen up in my more recent paintings.

These are a couple of collages I’ve been working from to make paintings. I will upload some more as soon as I can, as well as the paintings they’ve inspired.

As this is my first post I’ll offer a bit of an introduction to my work over the past few months.

For quite a while now my work has been mainly concerned with non-places: spaces such as stations, airports, motorways, bridges, petrol stations, etc. that we just pass through in order to get somewhere else. I am also interested in the idea of a passenger being “suspended” between two places on a journey, and the notion that non-place could be thought of as a state of mind or being.

Other non-places I’ve been looking at are recreational spaces which are out of season or disused, such as outdoor swimming pools or basketball courts.

My work mainly consists of oil paintings, but I have also been using collage and photography to develop my initial ideas.

I’m now in the final year of my degree, so I am working up to my degree show. Before then I’d like to experiment more with contrasting abstraction and figuration, as well as bringing more colour to my painting.