Fresh as Form

Here is MA student Judith Farr talking about her work, influences and getting it out there:
I use my subconscious to investigate formal elements of painting and drawing as well as materials. I try to break my own self imposed rules about form and content and surprise myself. I explore the conflict between the need to control an outcome and the desire to let go, and therein I find the unexpected.
I am open to self discovery through the creative process and so I try to embrace the formal, intellectual and emotional difficulties that emerge as I work and try to follow where they lead.
I begin by drawing which can become figurative at times and combine it with a feeling for colour, space, pattern and texture. I’m excited to try out different materials to see what can be done with them and how they can add to my visual language.
I’m very pleased to have three pieces of my work in a group show of talented painters from around the world called ‘Fresh as form’, which is being hosted on the artist run on-line art space Curating Contemporary.
The show has been curated by the artists Aubrey Levithal, Derrick Quevedo and Lauren Garvey, all of whom also have pieces in the show. It’s a show about paintings that show the process of painting, how form and space can be conjured on the picture plain and then reworked into to something new. These works show a love of paint and colour, as well as a fresh and fluid response to working abstractly.
The artists contributing to the show include: myself; Judith Farr (UK), Melanie Parke (US), Virva Hinnemo (Finland) and Aubrey Levithal (US), Derrick Quevedo (US) and Lauren Garvey (US).
The exhibition is a virtual one, hosted on the on-line art space Curating Contemporary which is run by the artist and curator Brian Edmonds based in Alabama, USA. It has been running since 2012 and has given artists the freedom to curate their own shows and include the work of artists from around the world.
I was invited to collaborate in the show by the artist Aubrey Levinthal (Philadelphia, US) who I contacted last year via email. I had never approached another artist before but I decided to go out on a limb and tell her how much I admired her work. We struck up a friendship based on conversations about our work and influences. Later she featured me in the Sunday picks section of her blog. Sometime after this in summer 2013 she invited me to participate in the show she was curating for Curating Contemporary. However, the exhibition was not to be shown until April 2014 because of the popularity of the website.

I haven’t had my work in many exhibitions but I’ve realized from this experience that getting to know other artists and forming part of an artistic community, even online, is really a great way of getting work shown, it’s also a great support network. It’s scary at first but worth it.