Preparing for a solo exhibition
Something I’ve known since I moved into my studio 6 months ago - though only hinted at here and there - is that my residency at PS Art space will culminate in an exhibition.
The clarity of this goal, the definitiveness of my timeline (one year), and the beauty of the exhibition space have been incredible motivators over these past six months. It’s been a privilege to carefully build a body of work over an entire year, nurturing a concept slowly, allowing it to evolve and develop organically. Moreover, I believe that when we are granted a profound opportunity, it’s our duty not to take the easy route, not to do what is merely comfortable, but to challenge ourselves to create something we once might not have believed we were capable of. Similarly, as an artist, I feel it’s my responsibility not to create work that is merely decorative, pretty, or tasteful, but to produce work that confronts, prompts reflection, and ultimately leaves the audience feeling empowered.
My exhibition will be a story of taking flight. Through a collection of classical paintings featuring powerful female protagonists—many in conversation with animal motifs—the exhibition takes the viewer on a journey from recognising the caged nature of modern existence, to grappling with the anger and desperation for protection that comes with it, ultimately culminating in a climactic moment of transcendence.
The exhibition will be anchored in the central concept of the battery hen, a metaphor for modern existence. A battery hen requires only a small space to stand, turn around, flap its wings a little, and eat its feed to fatten up before being sent to slaughter, never realising it possesses wings, albeit clipped. We, too, risk becoming metaphorical battery hens. Literally, the comfort of our homes can become the cages we don’t leave; from them, we can work, access endless entertainment through our screens, and order all manner of food to our doorstep without even meeting the delivery driver. Symbolically, our cages are also our workplaces, financial burdens, and institutions—forces that reinforce the identities we hold, preventing us from taking flight. The fault isn’t entirely our own; many of us are victims of systems much larger than ourselves, systems that profit from keeping us physically and psychologically enslaved. However, not all of us are equally caged. Some have more power to take flight than others, living quite comfortable lives in their cages, free from harm or challenge. But to what extent does our comfort prevent us from realising our full potential or from making the world a freer, fairer, and more beautiful place for everyone?
The biblical story of Judith and Holofernes has become an iconic symbol of female power overthrowing systems of oppression. However, as I’ve discussed on my blog, it is a multilayered story. Judith’s incredible act demonstrates the power of faith to enable us to do the impossible. While the slaying of Holofernes speaks not only to beheading the metaphorical snake that keeps us caged but also to confronting the snake within ourselves.
My contemporary Judith will also feature as a key archetype in the show, but the violent intensity of her symbol needs to be balanced with the light of other heroines. After my grandfather’s passing, a flock of lambs and kids was born on the family farm, reared by my cousin, who has inherited a new role on the farm since Grampy left us. But Nan has always been the dominant matriarch of the family, and the protective, defensive love of a mother is an archetype I want to showcase alongside the assassin’s bravery. While the assassin’s revenge disrupts the systems—both internal and external—that keep us caged, the mother’s nurture shelters the innocent from it.
Svalbard provided another piece to the puzzle: the transcendent. Borrowing the composition from Caravaggio’s Conversion of St. Paul on the Road to Damascus, this work is a self-portrait captured in a moment of surrender within the Arctic tundra. The light is bright and blinding, representing divine knowledge and understanding, with arms open in surrender to this knowledge. The “divine” might symboliae God to some viewers, while to others, it represents the potential we all possess, actualised. Or perhaps the divine is the landscape itself, the power of the sublime to remind us of our true nature.
I invite my viewers to participate in this journey with me as I finalise my body of work over the remaining few months. It’s my hope that by following the backstory as it develops, the impact of the show next year will be even more profound.