How to find us

WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?

HOW TO FIND US

THE GARAGE

60 STANWAY STREET

SARALANE LOWER LEVEL

HOXTON

N1 6RE

JUST BEHIND ‘THE HOWL AT THE MOON’ PUB

NEAREST STATION – HOXTON OR OLD STREET

SEE LINK ON WEB-SITE

www.wdyssl.wix.com/whatdoesyourscreensmelllike

contact SASHA BOWLES
07905  149 657
sashabowles@gmail.com

WE LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU THERE

Interview with Karen David

WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?

INTERVIEW WITH ARTIST KAREN DAVID

On a sweltering afternoon dashing about Karen took a few minutes out

Do you think there is a duality in your work between the painting as surface and the painting as object?

To me, they exist in a constant co-dependent disagreement, like an old married couple. The surface telling stories of painterly mystery, while the object reminding the surface of its limitations.

There is a great thoughtfulness in your work; where every element is considered from the exact shape of the geometric stretchers, the perfectly folded corners of the canvas, beautifully applied paint to the placement of the crystals and other objects. If one of these elements is out of place, do you feel the work is unbalanced and therefore failed in some way?                                   There is a lot of process, and like you say, a lot of consideration. I have tried to be more liberal about these decisions, but the end result never feels ‘right’ to me. Other people may not notice these seemingly small details, but I would know they are lacking and my feeling towards the painting would change.

Crystals play a large part in your work. Are they used in a cynical way or are you questioning wider beliefs?

I leave that observation up to the viewer.

Does the physical presence of your art transfer to being seen on a computer screen?

Unless your work is made up of pixels (like text-based or digital photography), being viewed on a computer screen would never really be ‘true’ to any material other than pixels.

How important do you think it is for people to engage with art in the ‘flesh’? Isn’t the internet a fantastic opportunity to access art without ever having to leave home?

To a certain degree you can get the idea of a work by viewing it on the internet, and sometimes that is enough, but at other times there’s nothing like getting close enough to a painting to inspect the surface and edges.

What are your feelings about showing in a raw gallery space such as The Garage? Does the environment in which you exhibit your work change how your work is perceived?

It’s not the space, but what you do with it that counts.

Finally, what does your screen smell like?

Amazingly, I have a ‘special’ pc which smells of whatever my screensaver is. Right now, I can smell meadows.

Interview with Ann-Marie James

 

WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?

INTERVIEW WITH ARTIST ANN-MARIE JAMES

Ann-Marie found time to reply to a few questions on a rare sunny day in fitzrovia

Can you tell me the starting point for your work?

I am interested in taking imagery that already has an established cultural reading that I can wrestle with, adapt, exploit, examine and transform. Purloined pictorial elements from art history are veiled, conjoined, contorted, revealed, emphasized, interpreted, translated, explored, repeated, omitted and manipulated, imbuing them with a new spirit to my own ends. The hybrids that I have constructed have so far taken the form of small paintings on found book plates, pencil drawings, large scale paintings and photographic documentation of interventions made (with permission) at the Museum of Classical Archaeology at Cambridge University.

There is an intimacy to your work whereby the viewer is invited to get up close. It feels almost secretive, is this close relationship between the work and the viewer important to you?

I’d like the paintings to function both from afar and up close. There is a level of detail that invites close inspection. Whether this proximity affords a sense of “secrecy” or a “close relationship” is a question of the individual’s response to the work – something that can be encouraged but not controlled.

Do you meticulously plan your pictures from the outset or do the marks you make influence how the pictures progress?

Yes, both.

Your work has layers upon layers of references. How important is it to you that people can access all these sources buried within your work?

I’d like them to continue, over time, to reveal themselves slowly.

Within your practice you use a lot of found old books, does it feel like a sacrilege to deface them and paint on top, or is that partly the point?

Yes it does, and yes it is.

To what extent do you use the computer within your work?

“Sending emails, receiving emails, left-clicking, right-clicking – I could go on…”

Would you ever consider having an exhibition solely online?

Sure.

What does your screen smell like?

Like a sky ‘’the colour of a television screen, tuned to a dead channel.’’