My practice inflects experimental fine-art moving image and sound with poetic sensibilities and sci-fi vibes. I tend to film opportunistically, so that the footage I acquire necessarily embodies its flaws. I have come up with the term arte difettoso, which I consider a bastard offspring of arte povera in its reference to poor quality materials. The footage is then subject to reframing to produce immersive audio-visual installations. This process is at once literary and scientific, with observation and invention informing one another. Observation becomes poetic inquiry, a means of seeing potential, while invention is informed by philosophical research and material interrogation. The intention is that any verbal representation of a work would necessarily acknowledge this multiplicity and avoid simple description of image and effect.
My practice inflects experimental fine-art moving image and sound with poetic sensibilities and sci-fi vibes. I tend to film opportunistically, so that the footage I acquire necessarily embodies its flaws. I have come up with the term arte difettoso, which I consider a bastard offspring of arte povera in its reference to poor quality materials. The footage is then subject to reframing to produce immersive audio-visual installations. This process is at once literary and scientific, with observation and invention informing one another. Observation becomes poetic inquiry, a means of seeing potential, while invention is informed by philosophical research and material interrogation. The intention is that any verbal representation of a work would necessarily acknowledge this multiplicity and avoid simple description of image and effect.
Film cognition theory, technological advances and philosophic discussions of the digital context are vital to my practice, since they affect and express collective and individual understandings of moving digital imagery in the gallery and out in the world.
My ever-increasing archive facilitates re-appropriation internally; audio is subject to frequent reconstitution into different works. I refer to these remixes as ‘circuits’, which can be considered analogous to echoes within experiences of time and memory. They are sculpted to absorb the viewer in subjective and intuitive experiences of duration, as qualified by Henri Bergson’s concept of durée.
The works are highly structured, edited compositions with layered timelines that challenge limits of reality, in that their hyper-realistic appearance might be fabricated through entirely fictitious means. In this way they are obviously a digital form of painting, albeit extending out of avant-garde film history and using cinematic archetypes. Films, for me, are not only philosophic, cognitive instruments, but should incorporate aesthetic enjoyment; an absence of traditional characters or plot necessitates a different sort of absorption and identification.
My current research resides in the arte difettoso misunderstanding of quantum physics with particular regard to concepts like time’s quanta ‘chronons’, Euclidean space etc which I investigate aural-visually in my studio practice, often also manifests within a creative writing context.
Nationality: Irish/British - dual, holding Eire and UK passports
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Contact: [email protected] [email protected]
2014 MA Painting at Royal College of Art, London
2010 BA (Hons) Fine Art in Time-based Media at Wimbledon, UAL
2007 Foundation in Art and Design, Camberwell, University of Arts London (UAL)
Moving Image/Sound
My practice inflects experimental fine-art moving image and sound with poetic sensibilities and sci-fi vibes. I tend to film opportunistically, so that the footage I acquire necessarily embodies its flaws. I have come up with the term arte difettoso, which I consider a bastard offspring of ‘arte povera’ in its reference to poor quality materials. The footage could then be subject to reframing to produce immersive audio-visual installations. This process is at once literary and scientific, with observation and invention informing one another. Observation becomes poetic inquiry, a means of seeing potential, while invention is informed by philosophical research and material interrogation. The intention is that any verbal representation of a work would necessarily acknowledge this multiplicity and avoid simple description of image and effect. Film cognition theory, technological advances and philosophic discussions of the digital context are vital to my practice, since they affect and express collective and individual understandings of moving digital imagery in the gallery and out in the world. My ever-increasing archive facilitates re-appropriation internally; audio is subject to frequent reconstitution into different works. I refer to these remixes as ‘circuits’ - C, which can be considered analogous to echoes within experiences of time and memory. They are sculpted to absorb the viewer in subjective and intuitive experiences of duration, as qualified by Henri Bergson’s concept of durée.
The works are highly structured, edited compositions with layered timelines that challenge limits of reality, in that their hyper-realistic appearance might be fabricated through entirely fictitious means. In this way they are obviously a digital form of painting, albeit extending out of avant-garde film history and using cinematic archetypes. Films, for me, are not only philosophic, cognitive instruments, but should incorporate aesthetic enjoyment; an absence of traditional characters or plot necessitates a different sort of absorption and identification.
Painting and Assemblage
From 2016 the artist collector Debra gathers seaborne trash off beaches and extrapolates, in her unique way, the implications of humanity’s discards and despairs at the impact on the planet. Identifying patterns of ironic fascination grows from the direct correlation between the synthetic and nature. Seductive colours, forms and textures of twine, rope and degraded cabling mimic seaweeds and bottle caps accumulate with seashells in clusters. An ability honed from experience reads the tidelines like a fisherwoman reading the sea and wind. A connection to Jung’s collective unconscious is acknowledged. The work projects a future seeded by research: the history and science of plastics polymers, tracking of environmental news and forms a philosophic contract from the illustrative incarnation of the simplistic composites. Delivers into the mainstream its own unique message. as environmental art addressing social and political issues relating to the natural and urban environment with added sci-fi motifs into the alchemy. Now plastics in our ecology is a hot topic Debra will still be a beach guardian but is responding to other contemporary concerns in order to evolve as an artist.
Textual
Whilst temporarily resident on Estoril coast I learnt about Portuguese history and culture and discovered Fernando Pessoa and I found a synchronistic pattern emerge as I read his translated writings. I wrote to soothe internalised anxieties and to keep my creativity sharp, a favourite haunt was the O Sinaleiro. Later working in customer service in Lisbon I had little capacity to have a consistent, consuming practice as previously, often I was by the Tejo in my lunch hour scribbling the odd muse. These written musings/poetry have ended up as artist memoirs and illustrate my love of Portugal and its people and are a conversation with Pessoa. All available on amazon.com/author/debzoid and some on Apple Books.
Timeline
2018-19 Commissions/private collectors: Portugal, projects ‘Politics of Interconnectedness’,Planet Plastikos
2017-19 100x100=900 on Google Cultural Institute - video representing the year 1942
2016 Exploding Cinema, Cinema Museum, London, UK
I don't wanna curate anymore, i just wanna accumulate content, online exhibition hosted by Charlton Gallery, London.
Videotheque Art Stream
The Listening Booth - online
2015 TOAST - New Curators Collective, The New School House Gallery, York, UK
RCA Secret 2015
International Streaming Festival
2014 ‘videoART’ Exsperiment - Szczecin European Film Festival, Poland
Graduate Show, RCA, UK
Hidden Door Festival, Edinburgh, UK
RCA Secret, Dyson Gallery, London, UK
International Streaming Festival
2013-16 Resident artist, Buddhist Army Records
2013 ‘Badly Natured', NEST, The Hague, The Netherlands
PNTG NOV, Henry Moore Gallery, RCA, UK
100x100=900, global tour screening project - still active
‘Notes to Self’ and RCA ‘Secret’, Dyson Gallery, London, UK
International Streaming Festival
WiP, Lower Gulbenkian Gallery, Royal College of Art, London, UK
2012-13 Collaborative project with Collectives & Curiosities, St Lukes, London, UK
2012 ‘Colour Blue' music video for little horse
International Streaming Festival
St Mungos –‘Without Walls', Guardian, London, UK
Artists School – ICA/LUX Biannual Moving Image Festival, London, UK
Exploding Cinema, Cinema Museum, London, UK
Tooting Construction ‘pop-up' Gallery, London, UK
2011 International Streaming Festival
Alchemy Film and Moving Image Festival, Hawick, Scottish Borders, UK
Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, Piccadily, London, UK
Music videos- Zook, Parkbench and Tommy Hinkley & Wandering Horse
Ottica TV Annual Screening, Bankside, London, UK
2010/11 Resident TBM Artist at Art Academy, London, UK
2010 ‘Erased Walls’, Berlin, Germany
Degree Show, Wimbledon UAL, UK
‘Outside the Box', UAL, London, UK
‘Testing the Chains', Electricians Shop, Trinity Buoy Wharf, London, UK
High Five, Croydon, London, UK
Annual Ottica TV Show, Bankside, London, UK
2009 International Streaming Festival – Student Edition
‘Q-Art London presents', APT Gallery, London, UK
2008 ‘Reflections of Choice' - Camberwell Arts Festival, London, UK
Making Connections, Open screening, APT Gallery, London, UK
