Natasha Walsh
Dear Louise (The Creation of Woman), 2022
oil on copper
25 x 30 cm / 42 x 46 x 3.5 cm (framed)
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Dear Louise, Woman beyond any movement or medium. You re-invented yourself again and again. 80 years of art produced after the death of your mother. You unpicked the deeply imbedded...
Dear Louise,
Woman beyond any movement or medium. You re-invented yourself again and again. 80 years of art produced after the death of your mother.
You unpicked the deeply imbedded sources of pain and tension within your own physique, leaving nothing unexamined to fester. You did it for your own peace of mind however you also drew us into doing the same. In such a way the personal became a shared physic reality which I find deeply compelling.
For me it was your quiet rage. I understand it personally, in particular its origins. In your work l feel permission to let myself fully experience it and not suppress or shut it away in a tidy little box. It becomes clear and focused, re-directed away from the disappointing inadequacy of the father, towards the patriarchy as a whole.
I created this painting for you on copper, a material I came to and developed through my own experimentation. I found it was unique in that, if left unsealed it would change my mark making until the oil set, stabilising the colour shift at a point just beyond my control. This seemed like the perfect vehicle to explore the vulnerability of a female subject, through the female gaze over time as both the painting and the subject were equally vulnerable to time. Unrealistic representations of youth and beauty do not interest me. A woman does not need to conform to these standards to be a subject of interest, or to be only validated through the male gaze without her own agency, as she so often has been in the history of art and popular culture. Your work was one of the refreshing exceptions. A woman becomes a complex, intimately understood human being within your gaze. Un-varnished.
Within this painting I’m referencing two elements from your practice. Your ‘Cells’, those domestic prisons which we can peer into but not enter, and of course your spiders or ‘Ma Mere’ (My Mother). My painting works within the idea of the studio space being a tangible cell. A cube with five visible sides. The sixth, the surface of the picture plane, is transparent so that we can see inside but not enter. It is bare of furniture except for a single door without a handle and a large mirror on the floor. The lone figure within, my reflected representation, faces the door. The door has no handle because this space is a painting. It can’t be physically opened anyway. It represents an internal place where I am trapped within the structure of my own psyche.
Barring my way is the shadow of a giant spider…. ‘Ma Mere’. A looming maternal figure you re-created to replace or at least balance out that patriarchal presence. Creative and protective but also powerful and awe inspiring. Taken from the recesses of our shared human psyche where spiders can inspire such fright, out of proportion to their physical size. The shape of this shadow in my painting, inspired by your ‘Ma Mere’ was literally drawn from the shadows created by my actual figure as I sat on the floor in front of a bright lamp. When I shifted the lamp I could create the outline of a new limb for the spider. This made your abstract form something that was literally derived from my human one. In such a way, I wanted to express my admiration for how you were able to create something intensely human out of something quite alien.
I work from life. The mirror becomes a point of escape by breaking open the boundary of the studio into the illusion of a larger space, through which I can create new imaginative compositions. However the mirror can also feel like a prison, constantly reminding me of my position within the studio. Frightened as she is onto the floor, my painted likeness is essentially frightened by her own shadow. At this moment she pulls back her arm from the corresponding arm of the spider and realised its true nature. It comes from her and exists perhaps within her. All the uncomfortable rough edges of her personality and creativity. In this work my face can only be seen in the visible mirror. I observed this view through a secondary mirror positioned behind me, so that my representation appears to become aware of the viewer watching her over her shoulder. Her gazed looks out of the picture plane right at you. I thought to call this work ‘The Creation of Woman’, as the position of my figure’s raised hand and that of the spider’s, references Michelangelo’s ‘The Creation of Adam’. This explores the idea that we are always in the process of re-creating ourselves, as you explored heavily in your own work. I also wanted to celebrate what you essentially re-defined with ‘ma mere’. Something ancient and overlooked, re-imaging it so powerfully in that awe inspiring maternal manifestation.
Yours truly,
Natasha Walsh
Woman beyond any movement or medium. You re-invented yourself again and again. 80 years of art produced after the death of your mother.
You unpicked the deeply imbedded sources of pain and tension within your own physique, leaving nothing unexamined to fester. You did it for your own peace of mind however you also drew us into doing the same. In such a way the personal became a shared physic reality which I find deeply compelling.
For me it was your quiet rage. I understand it personally, in particular its origins. In your work l feel permission to let myself fully experience it and not suppress or shut it away in a tidy little box. It becomes clear and focused, re-directed away from the disappointing inadequacy of the father, towards the patriarchy as a whole.
I created this painting for you on copper, a material I came to and developed through my own experimentation. I found it was unique in that, if left unsealed it would change my mark making until the oil set, stabilising the colour shift at a point just beyond my control. This seemed like the perfect vehicle to explore the vulnerability of a female subject, through the female gaze over time as both the painting and the subject were equally vulnerable to time. Unrealistic representations of youth and beauty do not interest me. A woman does not need to conform to these standards to be a subject of interest, or to be only validated through the male gaze without her own agency, as she so often has been in the history of art and popular culture. Your work was one of the refreshing exceptions. A woman becomes a complex, intimately understood human being within your gaze. Un-varnished.
Within this painting I’m referencing two elements from your practice. Your ‘Cells’, those domestic prisons which we can peer into but not enter, and of course your spiders or ‘Ma Mere’ (My Mother). My painting works within the idea of the studio space being a tangible cell. A cube with five visible sides. The sixth, the surface of the picture plane, is transparent so that we can see inside but not enter. It is bare of furniture except for a single door without a handle and a large mirror on the floor. The lone figure within, my reflected representation, faces the door. The door has no handle because this space is a painting. It can’t be physically opened anyway. It represents an internal place where I am trapped within the structure of my own psyche.
Barring my way is the shadow of a giant spider…. ‘Ma Mere’. A looming maternal figure you re-created to replace or at least balance out that patriarchal presence. Creative and protective but also powerful and awe inspiring. Taken from the recesses of our shared human psyche where spiders can inspire such fright, out of proportion to their physical size. The shape of this shadow in my painting, inspired by your ‘Ma Mere’ was literally drawn from the shadows created by my actual figure as I sat on the floor in front of a bright lamp. When I shifted the lamp I could create the outline of a new limb for the spider. This made your abstract form something that was literally derived from my human one. In such a way, I wanted to express my admiration for how you were able to create something intensely human out of something quite alien.
I work from life. The mirror becomes a point of escape by breaking open the boundary of the studio into the illusion of a larger space, through which I can create new imaginative compositions. However the mirror can also feel like a prison, constantly reminding me of my position within the studio. Frightened as she is onto the floor, my painted likeness is essentially frightened by her own shadow. At this moment she pulls back her arm from the corresponding arm of the spider and realised its true nature. It comes from her and exists perhaps within her. All the uncomfortable rough edges of her personality and creativity. In this work my face can only be seen in the visible mirror. I observed this view through a secondary mirror positioned behind me, so that my representation appears to become aware of the viewer watching her over her shoulder. Her gazed looks out of the picture plane right at you. I thought to call this work ‘The Creation of Woman’, as the position of my figure’s raised hand and that of the spider’s, references Michelangelo’s ‘The Creation of Adam’. This explores the idea that we are always in the process of re-creating ourselves, as you explored heavily in your own work. I also wanted to celebrate what you essentially re-defined with ‘ma mere’. Something ancient and overlooked, re-imaging it so powerfully in that awe inspiring maternal manifestation.
Yours truly,
Natasha Walsh
