Imogen Ella Richards BA (Hons) Fine Art
My recent work has aimed to lend visual and physical form to the observational and experiential. My work is often realised through text, photography, and film. Recently, I have been working with texts visual properties to explore and present my ideas, considering ways in which the visual meets the intellectual. Despite my multifaceted approach to making, my works share the same contextual origins, as my practice allows me to mediate between myself and my surroundings, allowing the work to become a kind of offering to the intermediate, to the in-between spaces, from myself and what I am observing, like an exchange. The process of making allows me to distil experiences and observations into visual artwork that can be reobserved and re-experienced by others.
The works partly speak to the role that control and secrecy play in the self, as I present elements of my thoughts and feelings on my own terms, in the endeavour of trying to control how they, and therefore myself, might be perceived. Despite the work stemming from personal perceptions, their presentation often contradicts these origins, as I attempt to obscure my own presence and identity within the work. Using the typewriter, who's restrictive and reproductive nature depersonalises text, forces the work to exist and operate outside of my own personal relationship and experience with it. Allowing the words to lend themselves to, and connect with a viewer, perhaps becoming relatable or humorous. Or using paint and the digital perspective of the camera to obscure the subject of an image. Creating a thin veneer between myself and the viewer, gives me a sense of freedom when creating and allows me to find humour in my own experiences and explore thoughts and ideas without judgement.
