Triptych

Raff

V & L

I did these two without looking at any images or people and somehow they turned in to people I know. The bottom person I hadn't met...they were a friend of a friend and someone saw the drawing and said it looked like him. Freaky shit. The top is a friend from NYC. I gave her that wacky fringe without realising she actually had it. BOOYA. It's a gift, I'm here until Tuesday and £3 a palm reading. Actually it's just coincidence but amusing nonetheless. They aren't well executed but with these it's the story that matters.

RIP Nylon

Speaking of morbidity, it seems to be on my name although this is a more frivolous matter. When I was 14/15 I loved Nylon Magazine. I really loved it. I even wrote and illustrated a letter to them asking for an internship and never heard back. Maybe that is the reason they are now dead to me OR the death-deal could have been sealed by the presence of the 90210 laydeeeez on their September 2008 that signalled their decline. They had become steadily worse and worse before this happened but out of optimism I would still thumb through one in the newsagents to see what they had a brewin'. And now, every time I see them on the shelf, now nestled between Elle and Cosmopolitan, I feel sad. These drawings were from a particularly old music issue...too bad such a fountain of inspiration is now as dry and shrivelled as Rachel Zoe.

Love me tender

Illness and the elderly are something people shy away from and choose not to confront. True, a sickbed is a scary place but it is an inaccurate representation of someone's entire life.

These two paintings are from the BP Portrait award, the one directly above being the winner by Daphne Todd. It is called 'Last Portrait of Mother' and was completed over three days after the death of her 100 year old mother. Although it is harrowing to look at, something about the artist being 63 herself makes it an even more interesting piece of work. I wouldn't go so far as to say Daphne Todd knew morbidity entirely but more that she has a gentle cognisance of it.

The other painting is ' Put the Dog and the Cat in the Poster' by Rosy Lamb and the drawing is mine. I did that drawing after seeing a similar photograph of a woman seated amongst her possessions. I liked seeing a commemoration to a life while the subject was still very much alive so created my own version, amalgamating different images of furniture, interiors and an elderly woman. I wanted her to be not in a care home but her own.

Polaroid Project

I made these paintings with a mind to explore the relationship between painting and photography and non-reality. I would have liked them to be less cartoonish but...an 8 hour exam didn't allow for too much finesse. I now want though to create more paintings with the more bleached out palette of a polaroid...all the people in the paintings are friends who volunteered/were beaten in to becostuming themselves and posing with a giant home-made polaroid frame.

Edie...ish

Tiny Masters of Today - Two Dead Soldiers

Their mom had silver hair

Johnny and Laura lived next door to me in Brooklyn. We were five and they were twins, the creepy tele-communicative kind. Most days I would hop the broken chain-link fence between our gardens and play. Their room was so decked out with shit, like hanging curtains and porcelain animal figurines. They shared a bed until they were twelve. Laura used to speak for Johnny. Apparently they are now in a band and make good music. They kind of make me think of these guys, The Tiny Masters of Today.

Death Mask Series - 'Johnny'

Death Mask Series - 'Sam'

Death Mask Series - 'Ursie'

Death Mask Series - 'Olivia'

Death Mask Series - 'Ben'

Death Mask Series - 'Jo'

Death Mask Series - 'Angus'

Marina

#25

#22

Karen O.