Category: Uncategorized
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Everything Colliding
The first thing I ever sat down and properly painted was a horse. I think I must have been 13. It was quite funny because I didn’t particularly like horses. On a visit to the New Forest as a younger child with my family, I broke away from them and approached a group of horses…
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Body Building
I have been looking recently at the work of Alex Katz and Wilhelm Sasnal. What they appear to have in common is their use of film stills, photographic imagery, and an interest in the influence of illustration and advertising. Music is also present in both conversations. I draw these comparisons from listening to both of…
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Red Shoes
Last night I slept downstairs on the sofa; it is so cool and peaceful down there. I woke in the night to hear running footsteps above me. I thought maybe it was one of the kids, though when I checked, no one was there. It struck me this morning that, despite the initial withdrawal, I…
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The Green Room
Getting off the train at Bournemouth Station, the town strikes me more as a city now when I come home. There is a beehive-like cluster around the ticket gates before we are released into the dark. I nip over to ASDA to get treats: whiskey, beer, gin, chocolate. I have it in my head to…
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Roadkill
Strange childhood memories and how they linger. I keep getting images of roadkill in my head; January tends to have that effect. Not roadkill when it’s completely dead, but when it still has just enough life to drag itself off the road and into a ditch. I wonder what sort of roadkill I would be:…
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A Minor Threat
While sitting with a woman I know this week, I complimented her on her nails which were perfectly shaped and pillar box red. She thanked me and looked at my nails in turn, before averting her eyes and complimenting my runners instead. My hands are dry with paint in the cracks around the nails: I…
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Gaps
Recently a subplot of a novel I was reading caught my attention and filtered into the work. The female protagonist has a child with a man whom she loves but doesn’t fully understand. He tends to be melancholic, and it frustrates her. When she learns of his affair, she moves away with the child, but as the child grows, she watches them closely. The child later shows signs of…
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Sitting
My son finds sitting for me hard and being in my painting room frustrating He says, ‘What is the point of all this? All these pictures, if they’re just going to sit here?’ I try to reassure him Its ok, I enjoy it The point is to try to see better They might go somewhere He wants a fiver for sitting for me For him now things are…
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A way in?
If you choose a group of photographs that have this feeling of ‘punctum’ then I think the only way to prevent the paintings becoming illustrations of the photographs is to remove them from view. Then it becomes almost like a memory game. What forms will remain impressed on your memory and make their way into…
NIKKI FOSTER 