Izzy Collis
She/ Her
Contemporary, abstract painter whose focus is on the process of painting and the materiality of paint through colour and gesture. Much of my inspiration comes from the natural world: flowers, the seaside, forests.
She/ Her
The core of my practice revolves around the tangible nature of paint and the process of mark-making. I’m particularly drawn to specific colour combinations and their subjective emotional impact on the viewer. During painting, I employ abstracted and intuitive gestures to create organic and fluid marks.
Throughout my degree, I have explored different palettes and researched the psychological effect of colour, alongside its aesthetic. My colour palette and gestural inspiration is drawn from the natural world, particularly the Cornish seascape and the Peak District. I interpret and abstract the colour palette for each place from memory, so it creates a great personal association for me. However, I hope viewers can find their own meaning and respond to it. To encourage this, I give my works ambiguous titles, allowing viewers to create their own connections rather than relying solely on mine.
Through my abstraction of organic environments, I aim for my viewers to feel a resonance with my paintings without being told directly what they are. This invites the viewer to use their personal associations to create subjective connections.
Additionally, the non-representational nature of my work allows for multiple interpretations behind each piece, which makes them more subjective. During creation, I use intuitive, gestural movements to echo the structure or ‘essence’ of my inspiration source.
I paint on sheet metal as I find the matte paint medium on the shiny surface to be intriguing as it opposes my earlier material choices. The reflective nature of the metal highlights the colourful paint and it showcases the environment it’s installed in. It’s ever changing and often reflects the person stood in front of the work as well. This elevates the piece and fosters intrigue from the viewer as they realise they are physically reflected within the work.
The size of my paintings varies depending on the desired reaction to the work. Personally, I like the smaller scale works as I find them to be more intimate as they encourage the viewer to look closer at the works to see the small details. In contrast, the larger works create a sense of awe. However, by choosing a grid approach I have managed to create hundreds of tiny paintings within a larger painting. This encourages the viewer’s intimate attention but can also be perceived as a whole image from a distance.
