My practice centres around my relationship with litter as a Christian, curating contemporary still life scenes through drawing to depict my evolution of thought and expanding awareness of this crisis.
I specialise in drawing, creating representational monochromatic illustrations using pencil and pen, mainly on cotton paper. The work is a testament to labour intensive, duration processes and is a culmination of my own meditative thoughts produced through the production. Each drawing is created using the same colour scheme and size, drawing attention to no particular object in the final works.
Within my artwork, drawings of flora are featured. These illustrations derive from the natural environment around my hometown. The floral motifs have deeply rooted personal value and are steeped in the symbolic vocabulary of still life paintings.
Nancy Baker Cahill’s exhibition ‘Through Lines’ served as the catalyst for me to bring my drawings into the third dimension. This experimentation allowed me to explore shape and form, using the drawings to create a pile of waste overflowing out of the frame, inundating the viewer with the scale of the issue. The work is a perpetually expanding creation, for every piece of litter I pick up and draw, new pieces arise to take its place.
My practice is rooted in my love for the environment and my calling to be a steward of this world. I examine the pursuit of eudaimonia, developed by Aristotle, and my own mortality through symbolism inspired by vanitas paintings, in particular memento mori.
Inspired by the painter Evan Uglow, the pencil sketch is intentionally visible beneath the ink to display the originality and process of each drawing, highlighting the value of the subject matter to me, reflecting the extensive time and dedication invested in its creation.
The use of frames in my practice is drawn from the curation of classical vanitas paintings found in The National Gallery, London. Negative space frames the work, amplifying its impact by creating a deliberate boundary.