Artist statement
I am a mixed media artist, and my practice includes painting, collage, bookmaking and digital art. Working with different media allows me to explore my interest in the impact our digital lives are having on our social and cultural practices. My influences include 17th century Dutch Still Life painting, 20th century Abstract Expressionism and contemporary post-digital art. I have a particular fascination for works based on a collaborative relationship between artist and technology, such as the use of neural networks.
My subject matter is informed by the realisation of how deeply embedded technology has become in our everyday lives and that this is altering the way we communicate, interact and understand our world. ‘Digital Remains,’ my current body of work, is an exploration of notions of a digital afterlife. Informed by personal experience of loss this work examines the concept of digital assets and our awareness of what might become of our digital footprints after we die. Imagining an afterlife where my digital archive may degrade, distort or be appropriated I use machine algorithms to interact with my work, allowing a degree of randomness and spontaneity to emerge in the finished pieces.
The work includes symbolism drawn from the still life tradition of Nature Morte, which reminds us of our own impermanence and mortality. In combining this with my digital practice I am exposing the human desire to leave a legacy and the promises or problems posed by the concept of digital immortality. Some people now believe that they can continue to communicate with lost loved ones through social media, such is the impact that technology is having on our rituals around grieving and loss. The death of its users has only recently been addressed by social media platforms and it is throwing up a number of social and ethical dilemmas, currently the dead do not have a right to privacy within the law. Through the evolving work of Digital Remains I am considering the implications of my own mortality as a digital immigrant and artist.