My work could serve as a guide on how to make yourself ridiculous. Through my work I strive to deliver raw but humorous self-portraits, demonstrating exaggerated and multifaceted versions of the self. I’ve always been interested by the self, or more specifically, myself. It might seem gratuitously big-headed but it is true, and my work navigates different versions of myself to try and satiate this curiosity/obsession with my presence on this planet and what I look like while I sit on it.
By using a range of materials in my practice, I try to juxtapose my works with each other, balancing video with object and print. I use soft-sculpture, fabrics and stuffings for their pillowy femininity, their bare fleshy feeling and comforting tactile experience. My process usually begins with sketching abstracted memories or feelings, and then developing the concept from there.
I try to choose my materials with the following in mind; what I can easily get my hands on, what doesn’t conflict with my moral alignment, my environmental concerns, then the cost. Alongside these deliberations I consider how the aesthetic of my chosen materials will sit in the work. I don’t buy “new” clothes at all, so it would feel false and pretentious for me to not extend this to my artistic practice, so I typically recycle materials from previous works, use found objects or pre-loved fabrics. This has become as an important part of my practice as the outcome of the objects I make.
Gallai fy ngwaith fod yn ganllaw ar sut i wneud eich hun yn chwerthinllyd. Drwy fy ngwaith, rwy’n ymdrechu i greu hunanbortreadau amrwd ond doniol, sy’n dangos fersiynau gorliwiedig ac amlochrog o’r hunan. Mae gen i ddiddordeb yn yr hunan erioed, neu’n fwy penodol, yn fy hun. Gallai hynny ymddangos yn afresymol o hunandybus, ond mae’n wir, ac mae fy ngwaith yn cwmpasu gwahanol fersiynau ohonof fy hun i geisio boddhau’r chwilfrydedd/obsesiwn hwn gyda fy mhresenoldeb ar y blaned hon a sut rwy’n edrych wrth eistedd arni.
Drwy ddefnyddio amrywiaeth o ddeunyddiau yn fy ymarfer, rwy’n ceisio cyfosod fy ngweithiau gyda’i gilydd, gan gydbwyso fideo â gwrthrych ac argraffu. Rwy’n defnyddio cerflunio meddal, ffabrigau a gwahanol lenwadau ar gyfer eu benyweidd-dra clustogaidd, eu teimlad cnawdol noeth a’u profiad cyffyrddol cysurus. Mae fy mhroses fel arfer yn dechrau gyda braslunio atgofion neu deimladau crai, ac yna datblygu’r cysyniad o’r pwynt hwnnw.
Rwy’n ceisio dewis fy neunyddiau gyda’r canlynol mewn golwg; pethau sy’n hawdd cael gafael arnyn nhw, nad ydyn nhw’n gwrthdaro â’m hagweddau moesol, fy mhryderon amgylcheddol, yna’r gost. Ar y cyd â’r ystyriaethau hyn, rwy’n meddwl sut y bydd estheteg y deunyddiau a ddewisais yn gweddu i’r gwaith. Dydw i ddim yn prynu dillad “newydd” o gwbl, felly byddai’n teimlo’n ffals ac yn rhodresgar i mi beidio â gwneud yr un peth wrth fy ymarfer artistig, felly rydw i fel arfer yn ailgylchu deunyddiau o weithiau blaenorol, yn defnyddio gwrthrychau rydw i wedi’u canfod neu ffabrigau ail-law. Mae hyn wedi datblygu’n rhan mor bwysig o fy ymarfer â chanlyniad y gwrthrychau rwy’n eu creu.
