“Landscape is a portrait of the soul”
A quote from a forgotten source scribbled in my sketchbook some years ago; it has formed part of the basis of my recent work where I explore the spaces we exist in, both physical and psychological. I use the landscape which surrounds me as a metaphor for my inner life of imagination and emotion. The material and immaterial are not separate but are reliant on each other to create meaning in our lived reality.
Drawing dominates my practice at present as the media most compliments and mirrors my subject matter, which is expressing facets of our existence. In drawing there is a relation with the provisional and unfinished, it exists in a state of suspense so connecting it with the lived life experience.
Drawing records the unfolding of an event, not the fixed reality of an object. It is a dialogue between our thoughts and our experience of the real; it has always been aligned with thinking and ideas, it has as much to do with reflection as with observation.
I draw what I know and experience not just what I see. These are not drawings from life, but drawings of life; drawing the relation between the visible and the invisible.
The fragmentary nature of the images reflects that although we live a linear existence, what we currently experience is altered by memories and expectations, our present being created by these absent moments. The sharp contrasts also convey emotion and induce contemplation in the viewer; they suggest a theme of constant change as the eye moves through the transitioning spaces of constructed and negative spaces.


I have just graduated from Norwich University College of the Arts where I was a mature student; I am now having to re-acclimatize to being just another poor artist at home working in my shed cum studio trying to avoid doing the washing and the far too numerous children that create it all.

I have had a busy 9 months since graduating, I was a finalist in the International Saatchi Drawing Showdown, have exhibited in London, Norwich and Kings Lynn, and will be appearing in the new series of the BBC 2 Programme 'Show Me the Monet' likely to be aired in June. I was Visual Art Trader’s Artist of the Month for March and they wrote of my work: "The senses of emotional uncertainty, of time evaporating and of forgotten memories in Kirsty's drawings are made all the more powerful by the beautiful and precise execution of the images."

Proposal for Daydreaming A Life Facing Worldly Things

Although my drawings work as individual pieces, they originally arose as part of an installation I created for my degree show, and I would in the future like to try and further develop the installation.

I wanted to evoke the fact that thinking and perception involves body and brain, and occurs within activity, this is then reflected in what the audience experiences. I created a network within which to hang the drawings and film because it enhances this idea of the interconnectedness of body and mind; all our senses exist simultaneously in our bodies, interwoven into one system that includes sensory data, neural processing, memory and imagination, I have combined the fragmentary nature of direct sensory experience in an imaginative whole.

However the limited space I was given for the show meant that my original concept had to be reduced in scope; I would want to extend further into the space of the gallery, creating a much larger network ideally strung between three walls; creating a paradoxical dialogue between the calm, delicately drawn surfaces, the tension between the fixed points of reference that anchor the work and the audiences need to negotiate their way through the space.
I would possibly develop and experiment with my use of film, using multiple projections.

I previously worked in Illustration and moved to studying Fine Art to create more expressive yet contemplative work . Having four young children I live in a world inhabited with material stuff and bounded by timetables and the needs of others, yet running concurrently is my inner psychic life, and the exploration of this has underpinned my study of the last 3 years. I used the time based medium of film in my work as an acknowledgement of our linear existence, and developed my drawing practice as the medium is particularly relevant to the subject matter, drawing being a dialogue between our thoughts and our experience of the real; it records the unfolding of an event, not the fixed reality of an object. The time and effort spent on these precise drawings is integral to the reading of the work, reflecting on the connections between a repetitive act and creative energy in all aspects of our lives.

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