Story, Narrative, Material

This practice based Professional Doctorate in Fine Art explores the interaction between story, narrative, material, and related concepts. My creative practice is driven by considering autobiographical identity as a reclaimed space, the boundaries of which are adoption and sexuality. Conceptually, my work is informed by a matrix of boundary points, for example: masculine sexual identity and gender politics, (concepts that relate to the working man such as class, craft skill, visual identity) and on an experiential level, genetic and learned behaviour as considered through the nature and nurture debates concerning adoption. These conceptual positions become articulated by formally engaging strategies of doubling, reflection, hybridisation, stillness and movement. These are materially evident in the range of my creative practice where sartorial codes of male dress are deconstructed in made objects, manipulated found objects are repurposed and film-based single screen works undertake to position the body in relation to the hidden view point. My research considers the position of lyrical discourse as an artist’s strategy, reviewing contemporary practitioners that explore these concerns. Through a developed material practice I have sought an exploration of how the intersections between concepts of story, narrative and material might contribute to how concepts of gender perceptions, family perceptions, and identity perceptions might be developed and articulated.