Thomas Murray

Over the past few years I have been using a mixture of art and science to create my piece’s of work, these piece’s of work reflect how we really look at art, there are many people out there that think they look at what the piece is about when really there brain has other ideas, the unconscious side of or brain is programmed, and that can’t be changed, this doesn’t mean we don’t get a choice, it just means we do two things at once. Have you ever been to a gallery and found yourself getting close to the painting then asking your self why do I, we do that? That is a rare time in which we question our subconscious even though we don’t know we are, many artists in the past have also tried using there subconscious to create work, Jackson Pollock, Wassily Kandinsky, in my journey I have been using Acrylic paints and canvas to help show that there is a big distance between the brush to the brain and then canvas that happens in a way we don’t notice. Hopefully this work allows the people to see the subconscious choice they make!  But this isn’t a choice you can think too much about, how would you look in to your subconscious?

Gemma Bowie

My practice has grown with me as an artist, I used to play around with a lot of textiles, but as my practice has grown with me, I have explored other medias like, video. Through this I have discovered a new kind of art which involves “interaction” and involvement from the audience.  To me dealing with art which involves the audience, it has great concept of socialism, I have developed my practice to try and see ways in which people need to communicate and interact with each other, I like including myself into the work through the music I listen to as I think this helps express me through the art work, and I want to see how other people interact with that music, as it has helped me in the past and present, with all different parts of my life, including my art work. The piece I am showing show the struggle of how people need to interact in a way which isn’t spoken but compromised, as they won’t be able to hear each other, I want the participants to draw what they feel or see while listening to the song which is playing. With all my interactive work I like to document through what the people experienced, by them writing it down, just after the have experienced it and also filming them interact with each other.

Natalie Bothamley

I’ve worked on the same project for a year and a half now, all stemming from experiences of my childhood. My father was an alcoholic when I was growing up, but mostly in the recovery stages. I went through every step with him, so every hospital, rehabilitation clinic and temporary accommodation, I visited him with my mother. Years later he recovered however relapsed in the first year of my degree; this marked a turning point in my work and encouraged me to create work on my father as an alcoholic. Contrary to the Richard Billingham’s series “Ray’s A Laugh” where his work is primarily about his alcoholic father; I wanted my work to be about my personal experiences and what I saw. Through my work, using a variety of different media’s like painting, printmaking, photography and text art, I aimed to show my side of the story, and how I remember it from a child’s perspective. For this exhibition I have specifically looked at the journeys I repeatedly took to the variety of places, which assisted his recovery, as I feel these journeys, are just as a significant part in re-telling my story. I re-took one of the most prominent journeys, and using photography, documented the route I would’ve taken years ago. In addition, I wrote the exact directions to some of the places, but how I remembered it and repeated over the text the amount of times I would’ve taken that particular journey, as well as making sketches of the route. I am displaying a series of books, which collectively tell part of my story.

Emma Walker-Harris

I am primarily a painter, but also enjoy drawing and using water colour. I use acrylic on canvas, usually on a fairly large scale.

Portraits have been a favourite subject for me for a long time. My Paintings don’t tend to hold a particularly inspirational message. I take inspiration from my family and friends, which makes my work autobiographical. I have worked on many family issues through art. My first art project at university looked into my past; however my current work focuses more on myself and the future. I am working in a way I never have before, I have come off of the canvas and I am painting six Russian doll figures. I am also painting on canvas alongside to see how the images have to be adapted for a 360 degree image. I found it particularly difficult making an image that could be viewed from any angle.

I tend to have quite a controlled style which comes from the perfectionist side of me. Which is why I love the work of Vija Celmins, her drawings are inspiring. I also enjoy Christopher Orr’s small scale paintings which have a more fictional, fairy tale feeling. For my next project I would like to look at using a very controlled style combined with a much more relaxed way of working.

Louise Bradley

Society and time are out of joint. Our lives are haunted by the specters of our past; they are in us- in objects, everywhere. Time- as it exists in us, is a complex web of ghostly unconsciousness, which speaks for us, and watches us. We are never alone and always alone. The non-presence of someone there, the watcher, giving an opinion... manipulating. The presence is to be accepted, incorporated in to the way we live and we think. Building a society of sensitive ghost watchers and listeners that are not afraid of the haunting thoughts that follow them. Simultaneously this will happen with the way we treat each other, life without exclusion, an equality to thoughts that mirrors the equality that we share. The death of painting represted here is not a destruction, but a deconstruction to create another reality, one with a better understanding of matter, existence, and time.

The influences for this work are Jacques Derrida's 'Specters of Marx', Buddhist philosophy, as well as the artwork of Chiharu Shiota, Angela De La Cruz and the films of David Lynch.

Claire Hoyte

A dream does not only define those dreams we tend to have involuntarily that occur during certain stages of sleep. A dream can also represent a persons ambitions and plans for change. ’A Captured Dream’.. visualizes my personal beliefs,thoughts and wants in life. I have always imagined what others would think if for one moment they could view the world threw my eyes.

By creating this collection of imagery i am giving the permission to allow others to do so. I am aware that not everyone will be able to relate or even approve of what they see.I only ask for you to try.. 

I can hear an image as clear as sound itself. My imagery is my voice with desperation to be heard. Its an expression for both Protest and Art.

I have learnt even the biggest of signs still remain unnoticed. I myself have no intention of stopping my attempts to open peoples eyes.’A Captured Dream’ focuses on my dreams but invites you to share the overall image.

Laura Green

Trusting the process: over the last year I have been working with the fluidity of nature in landscapes, where I allow the materials to work together and do their own thing. I place my own interpretation into the artwork; deciding where the paints and inks are placed into the pva, where I then leave the materials to take a nature course. After putting my interpretation into the pva glue I then don’t touch the final outcome until the piece is completely dry. Not being able to control the movement has been the most interesting part for me because I know roughly what is going to happen but I can’t control what is going to happen; for example the shape, size, depth and colour is different every time. The main medias that I work with are pva glue, inks, acrylic paint, wax, household and spray paint, coffee and salt granules. I have also been looking at how much of the work I control and the bits I don’t control. Some of my artwork is placed in an un-controlled space; where as the painting that I’m showing in the gallery is a more controlled piece, even through the medias aren’t controlled, the canvas on the other hand is controlling the shape of the piece. I decided to place my abstract painting on the floor so that you could walking around the piece and get different perspective of the art, it then starts to become a sculpture then a painting.