WOO'S MEGAN WALLACE FEATURES STUDIO WEST'S EXHIBITION, 'BRYNLEY ODU DAVIES: ARTIST PORTRAITS'.
"Artwork is largely judged by the final product hanging on a gallery wall or shared as a snapshot on Instagram, ready to be consumed by onlookers with little-to-no behind the scenes access to its making. But, like life, art pieces are a process - often the result of days, if not weeks, of hard slog. And the location of all this creative grind? The studio.
Be it draughty, cramped, leaking from the rafters or just an elevated supply cupboard, these often inauspicious spaces hold a special place in any practitioner’s heart. Even if it doesn’t look like much, the studio represents a space for artists to hunker down and hone their craft, explore new approaches and expand their expressive horizons.
Yet of course, the studio isn’t some hermetically sealed vessel far from the very real issues facing artists today - in fact, increasingly difficult to find in most cities and subject to soaring rent increases - the studio distils one of the central issues facing creatives today: the ways that an impending recession and continued cuts to funding places artists in increasingly precarious financial positions, while circumscribing the arts as a calling for either the obscenely privileged or those willing to fund their practice through myriad side hustles and part-time jobs.
Against this admittedly bleak backdrop, photographer Brynley Odu Davies is shedding new light on the symbiotic artist-studio relationship. With a new body of work, the simply titled ‘Artists Portraits’, now on show at Notting Hill’s STUDIO WEST, Davies is spotlighting 200 artist-subjects via intimate in-studio photos. First shot during the 2020 lockdown but continuing as an ongoing, three-year project, it provides a survey of some of the UK’s most exciting young artists while asking pertinent questions about creative labour conditions.
Below, woo talks to Davies about his own photographic process, how creative careers have changed post-covid and the enduring resilience of artists."
Be it draughty, cramped, leaking from the rafters or just an elevated supply cupboard, these often inauspicious spaces hold a special place in any practitioner’s heart. Even if it doesn’t look like much, the studio represents a space for artists to hunker down and hone their craft, explore new approaches and expand their expressive horizons.
Yet of course, the studio isn’t some hermetically sealed vessel far from the very real issues facing artists today - in fact, increasingly difficult to find in most cities and subject to soaring rent increases - the studio distils one of the central issues facing creatives today: the ways that an impending recession and continued cuts to funding places artists in increasingly precarious financial positions, while circumscribing the arts as a calling for either the obscenely privileged or those willing to fund their practice through myriad side hustles and part-time jobs.
Against this admittedly bleak backdrop, photographer Brynley Odu Davies is shedding new light on the symbiotic artist-studio relationship. With a new body of work, the simply titled ‘Artists Portraits’, now on show at Notting Hill’s STUDIO WEST, Davies is spotlighting 200 artist-subjects via intimate in-studio photos. First shot during the 2020 lockdown but continuing as an ongoing, three-year project, it provides a survey of some of the UK’s most exciting young artists while asking pertinent questions about creative labour conditions.
Below, woo talks to Davies about his own photographic process, how creative careers have changed post-covid and the enduring resilience of artists."
