CHERRY ARIBISALA
When I’m creating my work, or several pieces for an exhibition, its intended to be seen as one whole story. With each painting acting as a stepping stone until you reach the end of the story.
“My first source material is myself, my thoughts my dreams. Other than that is music genres such as jazz, r&b and soul music and alternative. I’m constantly writing in my little journal and onto studio walls like a spider web. It can often be a slow process of accumulation until I feel satisfied with the work.”
I was born and raised in Lagos, Nigeria. I move to the UK (London) a little over 5 years ago.
Moving to England came with a new sense of “freedom’ and by freedom I mean particularly in the variety and quality of material I now had available to me. I saw myself being more free and experimental when it came to creating because I wasn’t too worried about running out of paint or having to wait x amount of days for a particular brand or colour to be back in stock. Everything became more accessible and cheaper which meant I could move a lot faster and further with the type of work I was creating.
My practice is like a jigsaw puzzle made up of my poems, phrases, memories, experiences, hope and dreams, conversations, music and films, colour swatches and random sketches. All these motivations keep swarming and evolving until I’m satisfied with the composition that has emerged. This process could take anywhere from 2 days to several months. I find myself leaving a painting and coming back to it weeks later with a new sense of where I want the painting to go and what I impression I want it to leave.
For these works in Collection 04 scale was very important when approaching these painting as I usually don’t work on a smaller scale. I thought of how much space I could let go of while still holding the same impact and conveying the same themes found in my other paintings. Some works are an invitation for the viewer to move back and forth in order to take it all in so with these smaller works I wanted them to be more intimate and allow the viewer to slow down and be more subtle.
Cherry graduated from Goldsmiths, University of London (2022) with a BA Hons in Fine Art. Since then she has exhibited at Gillian Jason Gallery and Pi Artworks.