On the 14th November I was invited to the launch of the 2nd issue of Working Titles: Journal for Practice Based Research published by the Bauhaus Universität, Weimar. It has been a long but fantastic experience working with Xenia and Gabriel of the Working Titles editorial board and my two fantastic peer reviewers, Luise Vormittag and Hayfaa Al-Chalabi of UA; notably, the advice on the naming of the title that came from Luise. I appreciate the generosity of all involved and thank them for dedicating their time, support and expertise, it has been invaluable.

Risky Objects Abstract:

This autoethnographic PhD research utilises personal experience of eating disorders as a lens to critique broader culture. Poor body image will affect most Western women and girls; it is part of our everyday being. Western ideals have been used to construct race, sex, and class hierarchies, and continue to influence our cultural discourse. Although ideals shift over time, the white, thin ideal has been unwavering and othering.

Like the body, the home has also become idealised. Although the home can be experienced as a place of comfort and familiarity, struggles can hide in plain sight. !rough object illustrations mimicking domestic ware, I invite the audience to sit at my childhood dinner table.

Illustration must communicate with an audience and through my object illustrations I aim to develop a methodology to engage groups of women in critical dialogue on body image. However, this topic risks causing distress, meaning a balance between sensitivity and honest testimony is needed. By illustrating open and fragmented narratives I try to create objects that engage audiences while avoiding potential retraumatisation. Each group provides feedback to inform the following round of this reflective and iterative practice. This article describes the first group engagement where I consider how emotion and affect can generate affective resonance.

The full article can be found here: Risky Objects: Illustrating Situated Body Image Experience

The journal can be found here: Issue No. 2/2023 COMPROMISED VISIONS: “Lately, she’s been seeing things differently”

Very excited to hear that Aime (The Rainbow Project) and Niamh (Belfast City Council) have secured an exhibition space at The MAC this coming Sunday (21st May 23). Niamh Kelly, Community Engagement Lead for Belfast City Council says:

“Storied Objects, A Conversation Café with The Rainbow Project BeU group

Come join us on Sunday 21st May, when Storied Objects will be at the table in The MAC.

Over 6 weeks, a group of trans and non-binary people were introduced to still life drawing, ceramics and decal printing. Each of them ran away with their creativity, mapping out a relationship between homely objects and the stories they tell.

The group explored in many forms – playing with clay, curating their own object scenes, collaborating in a zine and through an unexpected kiln malfunction.

The exhibition takes the form of a conversation café, where the participants will be there to celebrate and discuss their processes and their work over a cuppa at the table.”

So very proud of designing and facilitating this series, the verbal feedback from some of the participants really made the hard work worth it (and reminds me to ask Aime and Niamh for the official feedback!). But, I’m even more proud of the participants. To achieve what they have in a short space of time, most never having worked with clay before, and working with such a random brief, each and every person delivered beyond what I expected. They also dealt with a kiln malfunction in the most dignified way when I nearly had a breakdown when I opened it to find it had over-fired and melted the work! Everyone just ran with each session and it was such good fun; lots of belly laughs! Really looking forward to the group feeling some love this weekend.

It’s the final workshop with the Rainbow Project participants and Belfast City Council this week. In this session, I’ll be presenting the finished artwork to the group. I really don’t think they realise how much work they have actually done! Really looking forward to this session.

I had the pleasure of working with the third year illustration students at Ulster University this week for the first workshop in a 3-week series on working with clay. I started by giving an introduction to my practice using object illustration, and this helped lead into a making session where the students are to either work with narratives I have suggested, or work with an existing project that clay may lend itself nicely to.

By showing the students two different handbuiling techniques and discussing how the material changes during different stages of the process, the students were able to make a vastly varied body of work. The objects will be fired after the weekend, ready for the second session.

And just like that (*insert wind emoji and ‘poof’ sound), the holidays are over and it’s right back to work. Must admit that I am still absolutely shattered, post flu and post neurodivergent Christmas overstimulation. But the list of things to do goes on, and this week starts with the 2023 International Symposium of Autoethnography and Narrative, followed by finishing the first draft of an article with a looming deadline, and checking submission dates for the International Association of Illustration Academics 2023 exhibition. To be fair, the pressure of deadlines help when you’re ADHD and they’re coming thick and fast!

I really appreciate Julianna sending over some photos from the private view of Reflexo at Echos Studios, São Paulo, Brazil. Very much looking forward to virtually meeting everyone and hearing the feedback on Sunday 6th November.

I’m actually struggling to put the words together here as I am so tired. It’s been a very busy few days over in Belfast getting ready for a collecting my first round of data on the reception of my object illustrations. The hard work paid off as I am sat on the ferry home to Liverpool reading through the feedback forms. Some very interesting data to analyse when I get back, which will in turn influence the next iteration of object illustrations. I was bervous about facilitaing the session with a larger group than expected as there was so much to remeber in regards to safeguarding as well as the research context and craftivist element. I was lucky to work with such a receptive group of women that said they could have spent thei whole day at the sesion rather than the scheduled 3-hours. Even as I left the room after the allocated time to clean the other spaces we used, I returned to find some of the group still working on their work; through their lunchtime. Reading the data and the many thank yous included on the feedback forms is truly humbling. If I wanted anything from the session it was to have the group feel they got something from the session, not just me (data), and that seems to have really come across.

I had booked to attend a half-day symposium called What Is Seen and What Is Not: Expressions on Class, Space and Identity with the artist Osman Yousefzada to hear more about his work exploring displacement, migration and climate change. Unfortunately the talk was cancelled but as I had already arrived in London, ceramic artist Sam Lucas let me jump on her plans for the day. We spent some time at the V&A to see the Illustration awards and the ceramics collection while talking about our research. I also tagged along to the James Freeman gallery to see the Eden exhibition that includes mind-blowing work by Janpeter Muilwijk, Claire Curneen,
Sikelela Owen, Carolein Smit, Olivia Kemp. Dark and beautifully intriguing 👌

Very grateful to Sam and I am fascinated and excited by her PhD research exploring ceramics and ADHD women’s body image.

I’m over the moon to have received an email today informing me that my abstract has been accepted to be a delegate at the International Symposuim on Autoethnography and Narrive 2023.

My presentation now needs to be ready for recording in November. I am still calling this a presentation rather than a paper as I am considering how to privilege the practice through my delivery. I am creating object illustrations to consider the difference between close engagement with an object compared to audiences engaging with an illustration on the page or screen. ‘Presenting’ my work online transfers the 3D to 2D… very interesting problems to work through.

I really appreciate having the opportunity to present illustration practice as autoethnography to those outside of the discipline.

International Symposium on Autoethnography and Narrative '23

I have found it so useful editing my website. It’s funny how so much changes as you’re ploughing through your work. I haven’t had the time to stop and think about how the work has evolved, or even how I have evolved as an illustrator. I mentioned before on a recent Instagram post that I haven’t made as much as I should have, or wanted to. I get so taken with the reading and research that goes on in the background; I hear in my mind the words of Rachel Gannon and Mireille Fauchon “Everything is your practice” (an introduction to the manifesto for illustration pedagogy: a lexicon for contemporary illustration practice, 2018). This is so very true. Despite not creating as much as I would have liked up to this point, I was easily able to chop work from the website knowing that this is not how I practice anymore. Saying that, I think it is important that there is space for WIPs, quick responses, ideation, sketchbooks and material exploration on our websites, it shows how we think and move through our subject matter. I guess it’s a sign of growth and I’m not attached to my old skin. Future illustrator me will be just as brutal to present illustrator me at some point.

What I have enjoyed is stepping back and realising how much I have actually done over the first two years of this research journey. I have heard the second year can feel like trudgin through mud, but as an ADHDer, the lack of structure and slippery timeframe can be difficult. It takes real discipline to keep going towards this this no-end-in-sight goal. For the ‘studio | academia’ section of this website, I started to look up visual evidence of all of the things I had done. Again, as an ADHDer, it’s ingrained in my very being to have to prove myself, prove I can and actually have done something, and it’s the same with forming opinions and knowledge; always looking for the source of what I’m saying. Probably why I get into the reading and researching so much! Finding links to achievements like being awarded the Mary Ann McCracken award gave a real sense of pride. To be the first to be awarded by the foundation, and have my work recognised as aligning with such a revolutionary force for justice and equality is, well, I find it hard to use words that do the feeling justice.

And to have my photo on the same page as Professor David Olusoga OBE… I’m torn between doing a dance and having a lie down. Might do both.

Mary Ann McCracken Foundation

I finally got round to framing the beautiful print gifted to me by @beccabrwn (instagram) for lending her the book The Sexual Politics of Meat (Carol J. Adams). Thank you for returning the book and for this stunning print.