Artist Statement

 

Artist Statement:

Emma Digerud-White
Visual Artist. Living and working in Cornwall, United Kingdom.

 

I paint because no one told me to. I paint because I chose it. I paint to hold onto what I know to be true. I paint for love. I paint for pain. I paint to capture the depths of everything that can be held, in a split second, but can never be described with words. I paint to show we are here. I paint to show I’m alive. 

Emotions and energies become colour and movement within my work. Figures are present with their inner landscapes spilling out as they merge and join with the spaces and people around them. I use paint, colour and marks to capture the hidden depths I see and feel.

Love, devotion, desolation, clarity, confusion and confrontation are all themes I visit within my work as I explore what it means to be here and now; as a woman, as a mother, as a human, as a witness. 

My works are composed with multiple layers of paint, starting with loose, big expressive brushstrokes, or smeared with paint directly from my hands. I often work outside, when possible, where I am free to work to large scale. I add depth and areas of definition as the work builds while leaving visible traces of what lies beneath. Stay a while and you may notice all is often not as it may first appear. My colours are selected quickly and intuitively, I know them before I pick up the brush. I crave bold, bright, contrasting colour and need them to feel alive, without them I am numb and life is dull. 

I use video and photography to capture fleeting moments of personal and family life, linking them to overarching theories concerning the human condition and psychotherapy. I flip back and forth, up a down and around again in a tireless effort to make sense of myself and the world around me. Through my work I present all that I know and that which I will never understand back to myself and anyone else who’s looking.

 

 

Image: Go Where You Feel Good, Solo Show, Circle Contemporary