Sandy Sykes, For all time : The Arm, 2004

20 February – 18 March 2006
Sandy Sykes
Artist Space

firstsite is pleased to welcome Essex-based artist Sandy Sykes to the Artist Space. Sykes normally works from her studio in Bradwell-on-Sea, where the surrounding landscape influences how she thinks about her practice. In the Artist Space she intends to create a new body of work, which is in some way connected to its location.

Sykes’ work responds to the immediate environment; she takes inspiration from a variety of sources including newspapers, found imagery and photographed places. Whilst in the Artist Space, Sykes will consider the historical significance of both the Minories building and Colchester town. The artist plans to investigate ideas of the past and time passing initially through drawing; research may take her to nearby sites such as Colchester Castle and Hollytrees.

Sykes works in a number of mediums. Printmaking, painting, book-making and drawing are all possible outcomes of her time in the Artist Space. Sketchbooks are central to her practice too, and she tends to work concurrently in a number of them. These act as spaces to collect ideas, becoming full of images and text that can inspire whole bodies of work.

The artist has recently been working around a new interest in dwellings as permanent and fleeting habitats. Motifs such as caravans, tents and kites appear in her new series of pencil drawings, signifying opposing feelings of entrapment and freedom. Sykes’ fragmented drawings combine snippets of information much like headlines, introducing powerful characters and implied narratives. Ideas of boundaries, travel and shelter will be explored as a way to understand how people survive the many situations they can be placed in.

Artist Space presentations sit somewhere between an exhibition and an open door on artists’ studios – new approaches and thinking will be evolving and not yet resolved. During residencies, artists will spend time discussing their work with firstsite staff and inviting visitors into the space to reveal their working processes.

Open door: meet the artist on Wednesdays 2–4pm