Blue Monday, 44AD Gallery, Bath

Blue Monday was a themed group show that brought attention to mental health issues on the day designated as the most depressing day of the year. The show has some conditions associated with it: we had to make work from a specific blue tissue paper and reflect mental health in some way in our work. The show was curated by Kate McDonnell and the group represented a number of recent and current students from the MA in Fine Art at Bath Spa University School of Art and Design.

For the show, I decided to consider the abstract concept of the working week and how our measuring of time might affect our mental health.

Week, 2019

I feel that the evolution of the working week may not allow adequate time for our natural human cycles of stress and relief to maintain a healthy mentality. So, I tried to visualise how the regimentation and serialisation of days into socially conditioned units of time might affect the emotional expectations that accompany that level of conformity.

For the first time, I also allowed process and mark making (in the form of typing, cutting and manipulating the material) to form the basis of my work. Although still heavily conceptual, the addition of a perceptual process was an exciting development.