Art Statement
As both an artist and chronic pain researcher and specialist,
I examine the diverse vocabularies used to represent the experience of pain across a range of media and materials. Working with sound, painting, drawing, sculpture and installation, I engage the viewer in mirroring the experience
of suffering.
I explore manifestations of individual pain through portraiture and together with broader representation of suffering such as the refugee crisis.
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My work encompasses figurative representations of the body in acute pain or primary suffering and abstracted representations of silence as a secondary effect of the limitations of communicating pain. I aim to respond to, increase awareness of, and create critical thinking around the use of languages of representation in the experience of suffering. Working from
my own experience of pain as well as
my clients', I address those who find themselves living with chronic pain (sometimes physical, sometimes emotional and often both) and how their pain may be represented in public.
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My recent work includes installations
—multimedia, sculpture and drawing—that explore the concept of silence, the meaning and representation of the idea of home, and a solo exhibition about the refugee crisis at Conway Hall in London. These multi-sensory media works enable audiences to be challenged by and interact with the complex process of representing pain. I take a humanist approach to this question that
integrates art and science. Through these experiments, I ask what the language of chronic pain is and
what it could be.