Hannah Boyd

A conscious of material

e-portfolio

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ARTIST STATEMENTTouch, gesture and trace are the key themes that Hannah Boyd’s celebration of materials focuses on.

The body as mediator is the crux of the exploration with her work focusing on the relationship between materials and the body, she seeks to analyse these actions and our social attitudes towards touch in the hierarchy of the senses.

Inspired by the work of Raymond Williams in his book Keywords; A vocabulary of culture and society, with its exploration of the ambiguity of every day words and the perception of their meaning and role, Hannah delved into the language behind the process of making, the manipulation of materials and their relationship to the body.

Her use of intimate phrases and verbs gives the viewer the opportunity to reflect on their interaction with the world around them and question their own perceptions.

She often prefers to work ‘en plein air’ retaining her connection with nature. She has a desire to return our conscious to humble and understated materials, by excavating our unconscious allure to the haptic qualities of organic materials, Hannah hopes to reconnect us with the landscape around us and the echo of our childhood memories.

The treatment of the figure in the comparative exhibition of Auguste Rodin and Henry Moore at Compton Verney gave Hannah the opportunity to study the importance of materials when creating a compelling portrayal of the human form.

On visiting the Babra Kruger exhibition at Oxford Museum of Modern Art Hannah experienced first-hand the physical and psychological impact of the power of words.

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She was intrigued to see the Key words exhibition at Tate Liverpool, which allocated works to selected words from Raymond William’s text, grouping artist work from the 80’s that explored each concept and portrayed the zeitgeist of that era.

Richard Long’s exploration of natural materials and the recording of his passing through the land exhibited at The New Art Gallery Walsall reconnected society with nature by bringing the outdoors into the gallery, this reconnection is something Hannah hopes to achieve in her body of work.

Reading Yoko Ono’s Grapefruit: A book of instructions, she found the artist’s book to be simple yet profound, Hannah aims to combine the conceptual with the material to engage her audience on many levels.

Using plants from her garden to make a variety of handmade papers, and mixing dug soil and plants into clay to make tablets she incorporates a linguistic record of the process or commandments of potential interactions with the raw materials.

She has created a number of site specific works, including a Story telling hut constructed of willow at the Festival at the Edge 2014 and alternative drawings using unearthed clay from Baggeridge Country Park.

She gathered the willow from a local allotment, finding it a nurture experience that is fundamental to the process. Extracting the clay at Baggeridge was a symbolic process being the source for local bricks it enabled her to connect with the routes of craft and industry.

For further information and images of her work please visit her website: www.boydart.co.uk or contact: boydiya@hotmail.com

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Bibliographykey words

A vocabulary of culture and society

Raymond WilliamsFontana Press 1988

GrapefruitYoko Ono

Peter Owen Limited 1970

Structural Anthropology 1

Claude Lévi-StraussPeregrine Books 1997

Phenomenolgy of Perception

Maurice Merleau-Ponty

Routledge 1999Empire of the senses:

the sensual culture reader

David HowesBerg 2005

ChromaphobiaDavid Batchelor

Reaktion Books 2000

Closer:Performance, technologies,

phenomenologySusan Kozel

Massachusettes Institute of Technology

2007

The book of skinSteven Connor

Reaktion Books Ltd 2004

Thinking through craftGlen AdamsonBerg V&A 2007

The Craft ReaderGlenn Adamson

Berg 2010

Theory of craft:Function and aesthetic

expressionHoward Rissatti

University of North Carolina Press 2007

Visual referencesKey Words: Art, Culture and Society in 1980’s BritainTate Liverpool28 February-11 May 2014

Babra KrugerOxford MOMA28 June-31 August 2014

Richard LongThe New Art Gallery Walsall16 April- 22 June 2014

Moore RodinCompton Verney15 February-31 August 2014

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TOUCH

Materials: CLAY, PAPER, PVA

Process: rip clay, mark with thumb, fire to 1250c, source edit synonyms of touch, print and cut out text, apply text to clay pieces with pva glue

Concept: AN EXPLOARTION OF THE RECORD OF TOUCH ON MATERIALS USING THE ARTIST MARK AND APPLYING THE SYNONYMS OF TOUCH

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TOUCH GESTURE TRACEMaterials: Soil

Process: USING STENCIL APPLY TEXT TO VARIED FLOOR SURFACES

Concept: Leaving a trace on the land using natural materials

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somatic extracts

Materials: Soil, clay, bone ash, pva glue, hessian

Process: weigh equal balls of clay, impress parts of the body on the clay pieces, keep a record of impressions, select extracts of the record and apply text to hessian roll using natural materials

Concept: An exploration of the interaction between the body and materials

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PLANT PAPER

PAPER MADE FROM SUMAC LEAVES

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PAPER MADE OF DRIED FOX GLOVES

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VERB VERTMaterials: handmade grass paper, laser cut text, Perspex

Process: mow lawn, soak mown grass in water over night, blend mixture in blender, bake in the sun, laser cut text into paper, frame in Perspex

Concept: using natural materials from surrounding environment to explore a process, which is incorporated into the piece through text

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Leucanthemum lyricsMaterials: handmade GIANT DAISY PAPER, laser cut text, Perspex

Process: SNIP DAISIES, soak DAISIES in water over night, blend mixture in blender, bake in the sun, laser cut text into paper, frame in Perspex

Concept: using natural materials from surrounding environment to explore a process, which is incorporated into the piece through text

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13 COMMANDMENTS

Materials: soil, grass, clay

Process: dig earth, add water and blend with clay, roll out materials and apply laser cut stencil to form 3d text, bake in the oven at 240∙c for 1hr

Concept: A SELECTION OF VERBS THAT record and INSTRUCT ACTIVE MANIPULATION OF THESE HUMBLE MATERIALS, PRESENTED AS UNEARTHED TABLET OF COMMANDMENTS

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RIP, TEAR, SQUEEZE, SQUASH, PINCH, PUNCH, PULL, TWIST, DRAG, SCRATCH, PIERCE, POKE, DIG

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SEVERED REUNITEDMaterials: WILLOW

Process: sever willow branches from tree, whittle sections of the bark, burn text into exposed bark, reunite branches

Concept: SEPERATION AND REUNION EXPLORES MY RELATIONSHIP WITH NATURE THROUGH THE USE OF

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the power of threeMaterials: hessian, willow, copper wire, Soil, clay, bone ash

Process: cut hessian squares, sew willow through hessian into hoop, attach with wire, fill bags with, soil, clay, bone ash

Concept:Presentation Of raw materials exploring Numerology and symbolism

SPIRIT, MIND, BODYFATHER, SON, HOLY GHOST

MOTHER, FATHER, CHILDPAST, PRESENT, FUTURE

POWER, INTELLECT, LOVECREATOR, DESTROYER, SUSTAINER

CREATION, PRESERVATION, DESTRUCTIONTHOUGHT, FEELING, EMOTION

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Story telling hutSITE SPECIFIC PIECE FOR FATE- FESTIVAL AT THE EDGE

2014 AT MUCH WENLCOK

Materials: willow, hessian, SARI MATERIAL, CARD LABELS

Process: COLLECT WILLOW, SPEAR SOIL, INSERT WILLOW INTO GROUND UNDER TREES, WEAVE MATERIAL AND WILLOW STICKS BETWEEN WILLOW STRUTS, PLACE BLANKETS AND CUSHIONS IN THE SPACE CREATED

festival PARTICIPANTS TELL THEIR STORIES IN THE HUT AND LEAVE A TRACE BY WRITING THE TITLE OF THEIR STORY ON THE COLOURED LABELS AND HANGING THEM ON THE HUT

Concept:PASSING ON TRADITION THROUGH STORY TELLING MAKING CONNECTIONS WITH ANCESTERS , the power of words

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