NIKKI FOSTER

Tag: writing

  • Flow

    I just read Fake Whale’s ‘The Ontology of Flow’ recommended by artist Ian Mc Inerney on Merrigan’s Substack. It’s a really great read, very apt about the conditions of our online experience, particularly in relation to art making and the consumption of imagery. But how does it make me feel or think as an artist?…

  • Red and Blue

    Last night I couldn’t sleep. I migrated to the sofa and lay awake, watching the silhouettes outside on the blind. I wasn’t daydreaming because it was night. I suppose I was ruminating. I wondered what I know of desire, how much is balanced by restraint. The colours red and blue these I know. Last night…

  • In Conversation

    I have become very focused on painting from photographs. Photographs I have taken, which is a change because up until last year it was predominantly from my mother’s collection of photographs, taken from a large plastic bag which she had planned to throw away. I don’t know why she wanted to throw them away. I…

  • The Exhibition

    She enters the exhibition. Roomsand rooms of paintingsstretch out around her. What is the correct order:of rooms,of paintings? Gripping her pamphlet,she begins the task,stepping up to each canvas. The paintings are of rooms. Conceptually, she entersa roomwithin a room one after another. She steps back. A red dot.Then another. But not enoughnot nearly enoughto sustain this weight.…

  • Original Features

    I would like to clarify the remark I made in With Love from the Suburbs about our house being eerie, to place it somehow, somewhere. What are the truths in this claim, if any? I could ask my kids. When they have to fetch something from an empty or unlit room, they dash there noisily, turning on…

  • Very Base

    Recently I’ve been thinking about iterations. I think it makes sense to think about iterations when considering our familial routines and rhythms: doing the same things, using the same objects. I’ve been avoiding spending money on new materials, so after running out of water-based oil paints I’ve just been using up my acrylics. Any acrylics…

  • With Love from the Suburbs

    I’m making a series of work based on everyday life in the suburbs: observing my kids, our surroundings, and something else too, time passing. I’ve always found the idea of the suburbs fascinating in books and films in their rhythms, aspirations and longings. What you see and hear of your neighbours’ lives brings a blurring…

  • 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…

  • 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…

  • 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…