I am fascinated by the collections that so many of us hold on to, that are dragged around with us each time we move house, like a vessel for memories, the extended self.

 

When clearing out an elderly relatives home I came across boxes of old postcards, letters, stamps, theatre programmes and hundreds of old photographs. It was a personal archive or collection, pieces of a puzzle that made up the individual.

Christian Boltanski explored the relationship between people and their possessions in Inventory of Objects Belonging to a Young Man, Modern Art Oxford

 

 

I investigated the phenomena of collecting, and was particularly interested in Susan Pearce: On Collecting: An Investigation into Collecting in the European Tradition. 

Looking at the work of Lucy McKenzie I experimented with painting in a trompe- l’oeil style. I chose postcards and letters and photographs, putting them together as a condensed collection trying to give a glimpse of the identity of the collector.

I am interested in ideas surrounding nostalgia and the object, and researched this further in On Longing: Narratives of the Miniature, the Gigantic, the Souvenir, the Collection by Susan Stewart.