Walter Benjamin wrote, “For every image of the past that is not recognised by the present as one of its own concerns threatens to disappear irretrievably”. History and its fragments stand as memories within the human mind, it is only when we confront fragments that memory is awakened, creating a surreal moment of connection with the artwork, object, and audience.
Nichola has a First class BA (Hon) in contemporary fine art, from UCA & a Master of Letters in Fine art painting & Sculpture practice from Glasgow School of Art.
1 - Could you explain your practice? Only you know why you do what you do.
Being brought up in the North West of England has influenced much of my work and life experiences, this is translated within my research and practice. Which is centered around and influenced by the fluidity of life and our cultural landscape, industry, ecology, and how we experience them through the female gaze. Informed by a variety of cultural and critical issues. I explore the relationships between materials, objects, and people, I like to disrupt, deconstruct and reevaluate their potentials and stereotypes, progressing our ever-changing nature through various mediums by expanding ideas on Sculpture, painting, photography, and installation of the found object and the alchemy of materials to create narratives and environments that questions our understanding of these issues. Over the past two years, my art practice has evolved and explores the connections and ruins of the body as landscape, ecology, and experience. How do we connect to our world and our communities? Using alchemy of materials and sublime spaces to create narratives and environments. Offering visual autobiographies, articulating images of mind, body, and earth. My interest is in how fragmented imagery, memory, and objects correspond to the fleeting quality of thought and imagination, with the aim to capture a connection with the preoccupying thoughts that shape one’s own experience of being human, in a disappearing world
2 - Is art relevant today?
Art is more relevant now than it has ever been, art is relevant it is food for the mind and the soul…
Art is a practice that had been stolen for many years and used as an elitists patriarchal tool, with us and them attitude, keeping it in white cubes with limited access, still, now many great artworks that were for the common man are kept in secure units never to be seen, except to use as a high priced commodity. I do feel that now with slow progression but progression non the less, that the people and community are claiming Art back…
Art in its many forms is what brings people together, it raises questions, evokes emotions, instigates progression and invention, it is not just pencil on paper, as many are quick to comment on when you say you’re an artist. Art is therapy, Art is activism, Art is putting words on paper and in minds, Art is invention and design, Art is in science and storytelling.
Art is what everyone has turned to in a pandemic…
3 – We are always asked what other artists influence us, we what to know what art you don’t like/understand, as well as what you do like?
I like art that conveys a narrative, raises questions, evokes emotions.
There are many artists I like Anselm Kiefer and Egon Schiele, Helen Chadwick, Cornelia Parker, Mike Nelson, Eva Hesse, Giacometti, Robert Rauschenberg, all these artists are communicating something to the audience within their work, be that feminism, ecology, waste, idealism, pain, pleasure.
My work is also influenced by the world around us, history, people, and places.
What I don’t like is artwork that has nothing to really say, question, or get emotional or angry about, having no context, no narrative, just a pretty picture or object, etc…
4 - If you could go back 10-20 years What would you tell your younger self?
For me, it would be going back 30/35 years and I would tell myself to not listen to those pushing me in a direction I didn’t want to go because they didn’t think art was a proper /real job/career option. And I would say you don’t have to eat for two when you're pregnant!
If I only could go back 10-20 years then I would say follow your heart and start that degree sooner…
5 – If you could go forward 10-20 years what do you hope to have done or not done?
I hope in 10-20 years’ time if I’m still around, to have taken my art practice into many new directions.
I love to bring emerging artists together, so exhibitions in many new places would be an aim for me, bringing these exhibitions to unusual more remote places creating accessible art for everyone. Maybe a P.HD if I can find the right place to push my practice, but also to have the means to create more installation-based work, I have many ideas just waiting for the right time and the right place.