Wendy Lewis

	Dandelion  [24Kb]
	Speedwell  [36Kb]
	Untitled  [36Kb]
	Untitled (Souvenir copies)  [32Kb]

Artist's Statement

'Wendy Lewis could be the Madame Tussaud of the inconsequential. Taking something perfectly ephemeral - a scrap of paper, a chip of wood, a small ornament - she makes a balsawood and paint facsimile of it, perfectly, so you can't tell unless you look really closely, and then why would you want to, unless you already knew? This curious circuit of not knowing, already knowing and not needing to know creates an odd disturbance in your sense of what makes things worth doing. They're not even obsessive or ultra-detailed to the point where you'd think the artist was intensely committed to all things tiny in a crazy way. They are just so well made they disappear even though you can still see them.' - Selectors comments, New Contemporaries catalogue publication, 2003

Wendy's work often deals with something apparently mundane and of little worth, drawing it to our attention if we care to look closely enough. For example in Untitled, 2004, tiny individual reflective glass spheres are painstakingly inserted into woodworm holes in an old stable, making these 'absences' become momentarily visible when the beads catch light from a parallel light source.

By pushing and testing the point at which something becomes 'visible', either the 'souvenir-ness' of an object or a tiny glass bead, teasing out a moment at which things will disappear or be seen depending on how we experience them, we become aware of ourselves, looking out at the world.

Biography

Wendy Lewis was born in 1978 in Bristol. She studied for a BA (Hons) Fine Art degree at the University of Central England, Birmingham, before moving to London in 2000 to study for her MFA degree at the Slade School of Fine Art. Since graduating she has exhibited nationally and internationally, with exhibitions including the Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2003 (Manchester and London), the 15th Oriel Mostyn Open (Llandudno, Wales), and as part of 'Glasgow International' in 2005. Wendy lives in Crystal Palace and has been teaching in universities for the last two years.

Contact Details

Wendy Lewis
E: wendyrlewis@yahoo.co.uk