SARAH MISSELBROOK
PRESS RELEASE
2005

Sarah Misselbrook’s art practice has strongly developed over the last 18 months with solo and group shows both locally and nationally. As a core artist with a space contemporary art gallery, Sarah has been given many exhibition opportunities for new art work to be viewed in both the gallery environment and the inspirational backdrop of the recent Artvaults show. New work was produced with financial support from Arts Council England and formed a new body of work entitled ‘Absolution’ on show throughout the summer in Quilter’s Vault. The construction of an artist website www.sarahmisselbrook.com has links to the various projects the work has featured in and will soon contain an online gallery facility to further widen access. Misselbrook’s work has featured on national television and in national and local press throughout the year, which has further heightened the anticipation for new works in 2005.

Recent Exhibitions and Press Releases

Recent Exhibitions:
Sarah Misselbrook Michael Naimski Gallery London (solo) October 2003
‘Self Portrait’ Southampton City Art Gallery (group) December 2003
‘Mind Consuming Body’ a space Southampton (solo) January 2004
‘The Body’ One Tree Gallery Petersfield (group) February 2004
‘Absolution’ ArtVaults (solo installation) Aug-Nov 2004
‘Human’ a space Southampton (group) Nov-Dec 2004
End of Year Show Michael Naimski Gallery London (group) December 2004

Press Releases:

Art Vaults (solo installation) August - November 2004 www.artvaults.com www.aspace4.com

The fascination with the purification of the body, the idea of the non-body and the conflict between the sensual and the skeletal is the fuel for the production of the work. The processes I use directly reflect the process we share of being and existing in a body. The materials are gradually drying out, becoming hard and wrinkled, similar to the effect of ageing upon our human skin. The work’s process, its gradual decomposition runs parallel to our route to mortality. The artwork reminds us of our fate and also mocks our obsession with self-improvement. I want the viewer to explore what we consider private or public, inside or outside but most of all grotesque or normal. These artworks are metaphors for the culturally inscribed body.

The works seek to explore constructions of gender, sexuality, nature and culture through self-representation. The body can be of aesthetic interest in and of itself but it may stretched to colossal proportions, or fragments, or seen from an unusual angle, it’s longing to break free of its own material constraints, or those imposed on it by the laws of nature. The work addresses issues surrounding the interior and exterior relations of the body, collapsing the body’s boundaries through a deformation that reconfigures the form, creating new shapes and voids within existing space.

This is the very reason the work speaks so fluently within a space such as the medieval vault. It is an existing space, not a fabricated white box, which presents the work visually, but a loaded space historically, culturally and emotionally. The works resonate within their surroundings each asking questions of the other with the negative space or voids surrounding the artwork becoming just as artistically stimulating as the work itself. Silence is overwhelming within the vault with space for contemplation and uncluttered visual communication free from commercial context.

‘Self Portrait’ 2004 - now on show in ‘Human’ at a space, Old Northam Road, Southampton.

A visual representation of me, us, woman. Commenting on appearance, image dominance, self-reflection as well as motherhood, nurturing and feeding. The imagery envelops sexuality, penetration and flesh. The opposing elements of weight and mass against thought and expression, the physical versus the spiritual. The viewer must complete the work by providing my body with a face, giving the work a voice. All my life I have been trying to find out what I am supposed to be.