Georgina Batty

	Undulating Floor  [56Kb]
	Smell Booth  [32Kb]
	Sweating Wall  [20Kb]
	Ramp and Walkway  [44Kb]

Artist's Statement

Written by Soraya Rodriguez

Batty constructs ambiguous objects that refuse to assert themselves by being hard to find. She also creates structures that navigate the viewer to otherwise unreachable places, often as a pretext for a single overlooked point on that journey. Interested in the entropy of objects, she examines the loss of perfection that occurs when design intentions become lived realities. Fascinated by the vulnerable relationship between an object and its function she gravitates to things that have lost their utility such as dust, waste, empty rooms. Her works invite the viewers' interaction allowing for incidental encounters that can spark unique moments.

Some works involve camouflaged structures that draw attention to their presence through a subtle device or clue. Sweating Wall, 2002 was part of Batty's Slade MFA show, in which she sectioned off an area of the room with a metallic tank that she turned into a wall. Its surface was painted to mimic exactly the rest of the room and a concealed cooling system kept the wall cold. Condensation formed on its surface and a pool formed at its base. The effect however was barely visible; most visitors thought the room was simply a damp room.

In Smell Booth 2002, Batty constructed a cylindrical structure at the intersection of two University College London corridors, within which she cooked bacon, eggs and sausages. The design and decoration of the structure was mimetic of the semi-circular architecture of the corridor intersection. Passers by were drawn to the work by the smells that flooded over and into the walkway.

In other works Batty leads the viewer to normally inaccessible areas or features of a space. For Ramp and Walkway, 2003 (Beaconsfield Gallery) she built a corridor which enabled access to an otherwise inaccessible high level window at the back of the exhibition space. Entry into the corridor that comprised an enclosed ramp and horizontal walkway is built directly from the doorway leading to the exhibition space preventing access to the exhibition space. At the top of the ramp the viewer was able to crouch and look through the window onto one of the busiest tracks in London where trains passed at eyelevel every few minutes. When empty, the window acted as a camera lens and images were projected on the back wall of the corridor. Over the course of the exhibition the white structure became covered in marks left by visitors.

Biography

Georgina Batty was born in Bradford and studied for her BA (hons) and MFA in Fine Art Sculpture at the Slade School of Fine Art. She has been exhibiting since her graduation in 2000. Some of the galleries she has shown in include The Pm Gallery and The Whitechapel Project Space, and she has been commissioned to make new works by Beaconsfield, Studio Voltaire, Wapping Project and Prema. She was short listed for Becks Futures in 2002. Georgina is to partake in the 'Sculpture Space Residency' in New York in 2005 for 2 months. She was described as a face to watch in sculpture in 2003 in Harpers and Queens magazine. During part of 2003/4 she travelled to India and Cuba researching for the Dolby travel scholarship.

Contact Details

Georgina Batty
E: georgina.batty@virgin.net