Emily Lane Bio

I am an emerging artist from the Blue Mountains, NSW. I work across a range of mediums but prefer experimental mark-making in drawing and impasto oil painting. During my degree I experimented with video, sound, and performance art, photography, embroidery and textiles, sculpture, ink, and installation. Although I have a great love of bright colour and pushing tone, recently I have been working in charcoal, and sepia ink. I specialise in portraiture, landscape, and figurative subjects. At the moment I draw on my life experiences a fair bit to provoke process-based research and experimentation.

My body of work “Names I answer to” addressed bullying, deconstructing name calling using photographic documentation of performance art inspired by Cindy Sherman’s Film Stills. My next project was based on nurturing habits of responding gently instead of reacting to provocation. These works were oil paintings set in a surreal world of a girl and her giant Duck companion, whose protective presence represented a person’s inner character qualities. After this I approached the concept from a different angle in monochromatic ink on paper, with a solitary figure traversing a gloomy barren world like a pessimistic Pilgrim’s Progress.

Currently I am continuing on paper to develop visual ideas taken from medical imaging of myself (ultrasound and x-ray). Reflection on the ongoing emotional impact of physical sickness and trauma will be integrated into the work, referencing “black holes” and “oases” in our psyche.  My most effective working process is intuitive, cyclically informed by self-critique, reflection, and question based research. Shame can be crippling to people and I hope my work offers a little healing and encouragement.