My paintings speak of women and how, through history, they have been under scrutiny regarding their looks, intellectual strength, practical abilities, and their creative lives as artists.
Using abstracted suggestions of a female form, I aim to question the stereotype of a conventionally ‘beautiful’ woman, so that judgements of ‘beauty’ or ‘perfection’ are no longer relevant, effectively sidestepping the ‘male gaze’.
Although my early influences were primarily from pop culture, the continuing discovery, as an adult, of the strengths and achievements of the women in my mother’s family has been really inspiring for my work.
I work exclusively from my own photographs which are digitally edited, and which, apart from the female form frequently include images of clothing, fabrics or textile design in a freely ‘drawn’, semi abstract, graphic style.
I paint with oils, some acrylics, charcoal, graphite, and marker pen on canvas, and oil pastel with white spirit on heavyweight paper.