Drawing, the Performative Body and the Object

Charlotte Hodes presented a paper entitled 'Drawing, the Performative Body and the Object' at Drawing, the Performative Body and the Object, a symposium at London College of Fashion, UAL.

This symposium was arranged by the LCF Fashion Design & Visual Arts Research Hub in collaboration with the UAL research group 'About Face'.

Throughout religion, mythology, across culture, history and fiction there are countless examples of how people have been inextricably linked or associated with objects. Examples might include Audrey Hepburn and cigarette holder, Sigmund Freud with his couch, Karl Lagerfeld with his cat and sunglasses and Homer Simpson with his doughnuts. Furthermore, the manner in which the Saints and Gods were closely associated with an object that in turn becomes a means to identify them, such as St. Genevieve of Paris and her candle that she miraculously relit. This event focused on the practice and research of 4 fine artists, their relationship to objects and how they shape narrative and identity. They also each touched on how their drawing practice is integral to this creative process.

Speakers:
Maya Finkelstein Amrami, is a PhD student, LCF. Maya studied fashion design at the Shenkar School of Engineering and Design and has an MA in Fine Art Printmaking from Middlesex University. Maya’s art practice is realised through many processes including drawing, collage, print, textile and performance. Her doctoral research is engaged with the impact of social media on contemporary self-portraiture, investigated on social media platforms and through her analogue practice.

Charlotte Hodes (Symposium Chair) is Professor in Fine Art at LCF. Her work crosses fine art and craft practices realised through papercut and ceramic installation. Her signature women, depicted as silhouettes, play out their roles in relation to domestic and female associated objects. Her recent solo exhibition, 'After the Taking of Tea' presented multiple groupings consisting of over 250 pieces ready-made tableware on which the imagery played with notions of tea and teatime, its historical importance in polite society and its contemporary role in which formality for the most part has been overturned.

Eileen Hogan is Professor in Fine Art at Wimbledon College of Art and Trustee of the theatre designer, Jocelyn Herbert’s archive, housed at the National Theatre with which she continues to initiate many projects with UAL students. Eileen’s major solo exhibition, 'Eileen Hogan: Personal Geographies' took place in 2019 at the Yale Center for British Art, USA. The exhibition evidenced her deep engagement with the material of paint and revealed her ‘thinking’ process through her exquisite drawings and notebooks. Eileen’s practice as a painter is centred on enclosed gardens and portraiture. She is acutely aware of the role that place plays in relation to the people that she depicts, and their relationship to objects around them.

Alexis Teplin is a senior lecturer at Kingston University and a visiting lecturer at the Royal College of Art. She completed her MA in Fine Art @ Art Centre, College of Design in Los Angeles. She came to London in 2003, thanks to a Royal Academy Starr Fellowship. Subsequently she worked for the milliner Stephen Jones both in the workshop, as his PA and in PR until 2008. Since this period, Alexis has been exhibiting regularly, including at the Serpentine Gallery and Hayward Gallery. Her expanded practice in painting takes the form of performative installations. Her performers move within an immersive space in which fragmented paintings, sculpture, objects and costume are interconnected. Alexis’ solo exhibition 'It’s My Pleasure' to Participate took place at The Bluecoat, Liverpool in 2020.

A related drawing workshop, conceived and led by Alexis Teplin with Charlotte Hodes preceded the symposium. It was attended by MA & BA LCF Performance programme & CSM students. A range of hands-on drawing strategies were utilised to investigate how to research and articulate convincing character and narrative and how the object can eventually stand in for the person.

• https://www.arts.ac.uk/research/groups-n...
• https://aboutface.arts.ac.uk/