BA(Hons) fine art |
Reconnect celebrates the production of our graduating students from the University of Cumbria Institute of Arts BA (Hons) Fine Art Programme. This mixed-media multidisciplinary exhibition offers a timely overview of post-Brexit Britain as manifest in a defamiliarising montage of grotesque mannequins, bogus night-clubs, stop frame animations, redux fetishes, politico-materialist collage, and simulated nuclear shelters along-side other acerbic comments on the reified condition of late-capitalist society.
Analogously, these critically-conscious objects, often satiric and contrarian, and grounded, so to speak, in a form of truth-to-materials modernism, seek to challenge - through the re-framing of collective experiences of male violence, femininity, commodification, and state power - the received orthodoxy of ruling class ways of seeing and knowing. Framed thus, these agitational, often vandalistic, anti-commodities and counter-canonic totems, confront the hegemony of the neoliberal ‘thing-world’ as a means to reimagine the public space and the given conventions of exchange, identity, and memorial. Martin Fowler
Programme Leader Fine Art |
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Lucy Bennington
Title: Rock and Human Medium: Video and Poem Artist: Lucy Bennington This body of work- ‘Rock and Human’ operates under New Materialist framework and largely explores the idea of Worlding as defined by Donna Haraway through visual documentation and text-based ponderings. The work additionally looks at the human tendency to over and under animate, as well as anthropomorphise agential non-human matter. Although the work will evoke different reactions in different viewers its primary intention is to explore the human- rock, biotic- abiotic shared experience of existence by allowing a consideration of the relationship between the two and by providing a platform for the meeting of the two. |
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Rebecca Bracegirdle
Project title: ‘Mercenary Britain’ “Few now pretend that class divisions do not scar or indeed define British society” -Jones 2020 ‘Mercenary Britain’ is an exploration of the increase cost of living through a statistical lens. The politico-materialist representation of scales contrast with the elaborate plinths to emphasise the increase in the cost of everyday essentials such as food, electricity and medication. This often-small increase over many years is glorified when placed with the plinths and intends to visualise the current struggle that targets an ancient regime. The counter-conventional social investigation asks the viewer to reflect upon this increase and consider the shocking impact this has towards British citizens struggling the most. |
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Abbie Crowe
Boozie Wonderland ‘In their traditional exhibitionist roles women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness.’ – Mulvey, (1975). Boozie Wonderland is a nightclub scene made up of twelve sculptures to create an immersive experience for the viewer. Theories from Laura Mulvey’s Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema are a key framework. The work focuses on the idea of scopophilia and images that would originally be simultaneously intended to connote erotic impact and to-be-looked-at-ness. Boozie Wonderland demonstrates the similarities the modern night club has in common with Hollywood cinema. The sculptures are aggressive and violent in their form and are placed on the stage. The Mise-en-scéne of the installation allows the viewer to adopt the cameras gaze and walk freely around the works. This study is an exploration of Neo-Vorticism, in which the viewer is immersed in the installation through the socially accepted misogynistic lens. |
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Shirley Johnson
Website Contact In September 2020, I ran for my life. I ran away from daily racism and hatred, school shootings, mall shootings, church shootings. I ran from a country where five year olds and their teachers can get gunned down and people stalk their grieving parents vehement in their beliefs that it was all faked. I ran from friends that joked watching a grown man cry for his mother as he lay dying had it coming to him. I ran from having cops point guns in my face because I couldn’t stop crying due to severe depression. I still haven't stopped crying. America is based on hatred and fear. On my first day at Uni, I was initially discouraged from wanting to express various mental health issues through art as it was more poignant to delve into politics. I hope to bring an understanding that politics in the U.S. have been a driving force behind my and many others’ mental health crises. My works are all based on the emotional and physical trauma and turning points that led me on a path out of the U.S. and trying to heal through art. |
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Kamilya Kazabayeva
“Desired” I am basing the foundations of my research on contradictions that can be found in advertisements. Advertising has always played a crucial role in perpetuating the mechanisms and values of consumerism. The main focus was on the creation of fake branded products as a basis for a conceptual photograph in the form of promotional imagery such as posters, leaflets, and live photographs of how those products would be used and lived in real conditions. The goal is to show how easy it is to visually deceive and attract the viewer using the methods of absurdity, desire, and brand name. |
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Liv Knowles
Website My recent work explores the theme of sexual objectification. Looking at both feminist and Marxist perspectives, the work delves into the role of sexual objectification within society, and its presence within the media. Taking into account recent events surrounding topics such as sex, gender, politics, and crime, the installation aims to reflect on whether society is progressing in terms of sex related issues or rather regressing work explores the theme of sexual objectification. Looking at both feminist and Marxist perspectives, the work delves into the role of sexual objectification within society, and its presence within the media. Taking into account recent events surrounding topics such as sex, gender, politics, and crime, the installation aims to reflect on whether society is progressing in terms of sex related issues or rather regressing. |
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Kade Livingston
Website Youtube Project Title: Сломанный манекен (Broken Dummy) This current practice looks at the use of metal work, creating digital film and images centred around a piece of text and then is visualised and materialised as props and then finalised into performance art/installation. My current work has me investigating the agenda driven corporations who use media and advertisement to manipulate and coerce the public. This being relevant to the current situation currently happening in Russia. These current issues have been formulated into a piece of text the investigates a fictional conglomerate which has created cartoon characters with the intent of manipulating the children of fictional Russian city Wocsom. |
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Mel McCall
The works created come from a place of lived experience and are all reflections of a personal experience with Anorexia Nervosa. The artworks presented all explore the relationship I have with my body and how this has evolved throughout, prior, and after my diagnosis. There is also an exploration around a sense of self, and how living with this disorder can manifest and warp one’s sense of identity. By injecting this experience into my artistic practice, the aim is to encourage a societal shift in the perception of our bodies and the relationship we have with them. Through understanding and exploring this, the work created allows a sense of empowerment not only to myself, but to the viewer. It is also the hope that by sharing personal experience, a larger conversion around eating disorders, our awareness of these, and their impact, can be had. |
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Nicky Pelton
Website 'The Quirky Menage' The Quirky Menage is a collection of nine life size sculptures in ‘human form’, along with their two dogs. Inspired by Edwardian photographs they came to ‘life’ using recycled and found materials. The sculptures are intended to be eye catching, tactile, and fun – not photo realistic. The stories of the original characters, that the sculptures were loosely based on, had long faded away. The Quirky Menage is an opportunity for those lives to briefly ‘live’ again in the 21st century. The Quirky Menage is set in an installation with a nod to an Edwardian time. |
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Elizabeth McGarry
Website Elizabeth McGarry (b.2000) has a particular desire to learn about the past, specifically dress and social histories. As a practising artist, she has a love for experimenting and playing with different types of media. Her focus is working with textiles, collage, printmaking, graphic digital art, painting, and illustration; often mixing a range of media. McGarry is also passionate about creating references to culture, society, and political issues whether that be now or looking back at political and historical events, which remain relevant today in either a satirical manner or with a sense of seriousness. |
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Bethany Tibbles
The Disappearance of Time and Space Multi-media art including paintings/drawings and sculptures Inspired by Mark Fisher’s hauntology, my work looks at how the stories we read haunt the places we read them. When immersed in a book, we lose all concept of time and space. Hours can slip by in what feels like seconds, and our world morphs into the background as our imagination takes the forefront. My art toys at the line between the natural and the man-made, it creates a conversation between humanity and mother nature, and it confronts the abuse our home suffers at our benefit. “We are using resources as if we had two planets not one… There can be no Plan B because there is no planet B.” - Ban Ki-Moon |
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The University of Cumbria Institute of the Arts | Brampton Road | Carlisle | Cumbria | CA3 9AY | UK
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