SHELLY TREGONING
I don’t want simply to re-create an illustration of place or person, but rather through marks, painterly gestures and line, to express sensation and a sense of identity.
“The underlying focus of my work is probably the human condition and the question of personal identity. Life happens to all of us, those familiar human things, love, happiness, disappointment, pain, fear - they are experiences that are played out in all cultures. These things are base, primal. I am drawn in by the physicality of the human form and how this physicality, despite our best efforts otherwise, can betray our emotional state. ”
I use monoprinting as another way to express my ideas and the process satisfies me enormously - the wiping away of ink from the plate, of the subtly different, fading versions that can be lifted from one printing plate to another - the journey between ‘ghost’ copies - the making of a different image every time. It's almost like a film strip. I enjoy the painterly quality of mono prints - it can get you away from ‘line’, the ability to layer paint up, plate by plate, and retain the ability to draw onto it.
I want to convey a sense of immediacy, brevity and transience. In a quiet way I want to speak of universal truths and what it is to be emotionally connected.
I work at CAST Studios in Cornwall. The studio is wonderful - a large old classroom. The size has very much influenced the size of my work as I can make much larger prints - These can differ from smaller, intense pieces and they can become much looser and more gestural.
Shelly Tregoning was born in Mauritius and she spent her early life being brought up in the West Indies. She was educated in England and now lives and works in Cornwall, having gained her BA in Fine Art at University College, Falmouth in 2011. She won 2nd prize at the Trinity Buoy Drawing Prize, 2019 has been selected for the Royal Academy Summer Shows, The Discerning Eye, the National Open Art Competition, RWA exhibitions and the Threadneedle Prize Exhibition.
