Songs of the River (2021)

An extension of my experimental 2019 work, this collection from 2021 is a deeper and more resolved exploration of the cyanotype process reworking the sunprints with illustration and the development of a personal visual language. Using symbols and motifs from the natural environment around me, the work bacame more codified as I simplified the illustrative elements and converted them to a visual shorthand. Influenced by the processes and mark-making from other mediums I work with, this body of work consolidated the various arms of my arts practice.

 

The line work and mark-making is an extension of my ceramic processes and is a visual code developed to represent elements of the river and my personal experiences. The operates on multiple levels - physical, emotional, mental - and references the world both around and within me. And the interactions between them. The suck of the mud, the indents of crab breathing holes in the sea bed, sea creatures and molluscs are all represented through a patterning of shapes and form.

 

The symbols and motifs which appear in my work are universal across cultures and reflective of the shapes I observe in my environment but also my inner world.