I am a recent graduate of BA Illustration at Camberwell College of Arts, London. Upon graduation I was immediately offered a solo exhibition at Art Work Space, London. Since then I have continued to make work for a number of opportunities including the Somerset House graphic art fair ‘Pick Me Up’ where I was affiliated with ‘It’s Nice That’ and ‘Print Club’, an auction at the Analix Forever Gallery in Switzerland, where my work was sold alongside the work of Mat Collishaw and Tracy Emin and have had my work featured in the ‘Nobrow 4’ publication.
My work is currently focused on pen and ink drawings, with each image deriving from a narrative. I like to play with contorted figures, the grotesque and mythologies, taking strong inspiration from Flemish renaissance artists, in particular Pieter Breughel. My drawings are a response to seemingly small stories and details, which have caught my attention. I take and expand upon these details to create work that contains expansive meaning and symbolism. Within the landscapes and details of my images there are multiple narratives composing a discourse on existentialism.
My composition is both assured and intricate, playfully distorting familiar themes, such as the eroticized subject matters of life, death, heaven and hell and is reinforced by strong line and pen work. My imagery is aimed at promising the chance of a new and subversive discovery, as if navigating oneself through a labyrinth. The narratives and characters at the heart of the work create an overwhelming sense of action, often on the verge of the primal and grotesque. However, I try to imbue each piece with humour and one can sense a note of comicirony through the underlying absurdity of the images.
www.katiebrookes.com
Katie's work is being exhibited as part of our Art Crawl! To see her work come to The Enterprise (2 haverstock hill, Camden, nw3 2bl). It will be displayed from Aug 18th to Sept 18th.
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