Abigail Thomas

Artist Statement

Within the white cube gallery, that has been the neutral setting for art exhibitions for years, resides the emptiness that that neutralness gives. Generally speaking there is a certain kind of intention in going into a gallery, a space that is specifically designed to show off the unique, elevated status of the art objects placed within its walls, it is this that separates the art and the gallery from the rest of the world. My work looks at the relationship between the studio and that gallery space.

There are stages of removal that my work goes through; every stage removes it further from the original intent creating new intentions to add to. In the beginning the idea is taken from the world outside to the studio, a removal from everyday life. I seek out what I have called a ‘grey area’ into which the work can be removed once more from the studio, back into the everydayness of the world before it is revealed to the gallery setting. These ‘grey areas’ should be spaces between studio and the white cube, the space between removal and revealing.

The elements that make up the installations made within the grey area range from objects to photographs. They work with and against each other, and with and against the space in which they reside. The spaces are influential and this is reflected in the architectonic areas of my work. Some spaces, especially the gallery set work, are used as a kind of archive display. The work then takes on this feeling of a collection, a document of documents.

2006

Abigail Thomas