Name: Chloe Beecham
DOB: September 1994
Place of Birth: Lincolnshire, United Kingdom
Occupation: Trainee teacher
I am a textile artist and a recent graduate from Manchester School of Art. I specialise in mixed media, with a focus on embroidery techniques. Concept and process are of equal importance to me, and I often use one to convey the other. I find inspiration in the way things make me feel and am drawn to details that are often overlooked.
As an artist, I am interested in pursuing ideas concerning motherhood, and specifically, the dynamic that surrounds the mother/daughter relationship.
Recent work is sculptural in its outcome and is site-specific in both its design and articulation. Embroidery techniques such as the buttonhole rouleaux fastening are utilized and then pushed to epic proportions. Soft cloth is utilized to form heavy sculptural line qualities that sweep and soar through the air or hang limp and lifeless. This cloth based line has its origination in drawings made on paper; ink, gouache and pencil that moves at different speeds as it is pushed and teased around a sheet of paper. Cloth enables this line to escape the two-dimensionality of the paper and to literally become ‘drawn’ within an actual three-dimensional space. The scale of the work directly aims to engage the viewer; but it is not particularly embracing. It shields, it dissects but it is also black and monolithic. There is much discomfort here.
I respond primarily to spaces. I am fascinated by the way people use spaces, particularly public spaces, and find it interesting to consider the way I could change the way people respond. I am enthusiastic about showing my work in non-traditional gallery spaces. The way in which a person behaves in a space is really interesting to me. It is something that is often dictated by social norms. For example in traditional art galleries, members of the public are more than likely forbidden from touching and interacting with the work. This is an idea that I aim to challenge within my work. It is important to me that people engage with my work, and feel comfortable to touch and manipulate what they see.
Textiles in Practice
Detail (rubber binding)
My practice is very process led. My textiles background has encouraged me to be very tactile. This has coloured my view of my own practice, and has led me to create work that people are drawn to interact with. I’m interested in texture and line, and the use of scale to engage the audience. I am mostly inspired by space- particularly the idea of using space as a canvas. I enjoy the notion of using “dead spaces” and voids to create something where there was once nothing.
I’m currently studying to become a Higher Education lecturer and my aims for the future are to teach alongside continuing my practice. I would also like to undertake an MA in Fine Art in the near future.
