Title
Untitled Shower Scene, Dream Home exhibition, Phoenix Gallery, Brighton Arts Festival 2010
Project
A shower room built inside a constructed house exhibition space inside a gallery. Includes sound, music, lights and shadows cast by an animated puppet and hair piece.
The voyeuristic act of entering an occupied, dimly lit shower room through a closed door unsettles the viewer by blurring the boundaries between personal and public space.
In contrast to the surrounding joyful house, the shower room has a creepy, neglected atmosphere and appears to be damp and mouldy.
Inside the cubicle the shadow of an unseen character is glimpsed behind the shower curtain, the showering sounds strangely juxtaposed with upbeat rockabilly music playing on the radio.
Discarded hair and other matter seems to have collected and evolved into curious entities, which in some cases are moving around!
Further information on the Dream Home exhibition:
click here to view
A documentary on the Dream Home exhibition by Matt Page can be viewed here:
click here to view
Title
Props for Dream Home exhibition
Media
Mixed media, masking tape, paint, electrical cable, old tshirt.
The props were used as part of the Untitled Shower Scene installation at Phoenix Gallery, 2010
Title
Belongings, Dream Home exhibition, Phoenix Gallery, Brighton Arts Festival 2010
Project
'Belongings’ comprises of an arrangment of boxes full of 'photos' and objects referencing the 'personal items' we choose to move from place to place, transforming each new location into a home. Emotions become attached to old family photographs and hand-me-down objects through the stories passed down the generations.
Even other people's belongings become a source of fascination when laid out at a boot-sale or when visiting the homes of other people.
The installation boxes packed with the everyday items are in an unsettling position of being packed away, or perhaps unpacked, the framed pictures lying against the wall.
Generations of slightly unreal looking people populate the photographs, the result of swapping and transforming facial features from nine random people, giving them shared ‘family’ characteristics. Clothes and backgrounds were tailored to suit each new composite character.
The ‘personal’ belongings were randomly purchased second hand, their original owners and context unknown. Viewed together the items form a past history constructed from connections made by the viewer's imagination.
Title
Miyagi
Project
‘Miyagi’ is made entirely from tourist snap-shots. Objects and buildings from the photographs are cut out and layered onto photos from other cities. Montages of landscapes from Kyoto, Osaka and Tokyo are reconstructed like disjointed memories. Movement is restricted to the horizontal and vertical planes in a constantly shifting whirlwind journey of Japan, while curios that caught the eye fade in and out as seen through tourists eyes, pausing only for the duration of a snapshot.
Screened at Phoenix Gallery during the May Arts Festival 2009 with BANG! (Brighton Animators Network Group)
Title
The Island
Media
Tent containing animated lamp, trees, camp fire with animated talking flame characters, back projection, soundscape, scent of woodsmoke, juniper and douglas fir, blackout curtain, real leaves and foliage.
Inspired by the sights, sounds and smells of a childhood camping destination on a tiny Scottish island, the installation combines playful ideas from childhood imagination with documentation collected on a return visit in 2009
The flames were screened on a monitor disguised as a typical campfire, each flame had a face animated to actors voices narrating a humorous ghost story over the sounds of crackling and popping logs.
The lamp animation resonates with a constant irritating buzz of giant horse flies and midges which circle the flame. A harsh zapping noise coincides with an animated smoking effect as the giant 'killer' insects get too close.
Exhibited at Phoenix Studios Open Weekend 2009
Title
Animatryoshka
Media
Blackboard paint and varnish on an army of blank wooden matryoshka dolls. The original figures created in 2007 were highly detailed and brightly coloured with a matte finish, taking references from Mexican and Japanese folk art.
The designs were highly refined in 2008, using only blackboard paint on satin varnished natural wood.
The paper cut-out mirrored designs applied to the figures reference Tikki, Maori and totem pole artwork and were inspired by the Japanese design concept, Notan.