Master Graphics
An exhibition of original and collectable prints

Sir Peter Blake . Henri Matisse . Sir Terry Frost RA . Sandra Blow RA . Corinna Button ARE
David Hockney RA . Lovis Corinth . Herman Webster 

28th September - 13th October 2007 

Private view Thursday 27th September  7 - 10pm

Corinna Button 

In everyday encounters, I see something else quite fascinating happening beneath the surface. It could be a restless energy or unspoken words, all tangled up with different emotions. I use this to conceive characters and situations to reveal an imagined world. I want to compel the viewer into seeing new and significant aspects of the human experience of our time. My inspiration comes from many sources, often presenting itself quite unexpectedly.

It can manifest itself as something that ,on the surface, appears quite ordinary. For example, brushing hair, or sitting on a train, seeing an advert in a magazine, or it could be a word or a comment, a particular fabric in a dress or curtains. Sometimes, it‚s autobiographical and personal. Whatever the trigger, I frequently draw on these disparate sources and bring them together to capture and exaggerate identity or to emphasize a particular something about the human condition

Currently I am exploring the complex relationships that are formed between teenage girls and young women. This theme initially grew out of my daughter‚s numerous recounted experiences and snatches of conversations overheard from her school and college days experiences. It has since been further developed to reflect the wider picture - street culture (ie; the build up of this Œ‚new wave‚‚ of street culture amongst teenagers, particularly females.) The media , obsessions with image, gossip, fashion, the minutiae of celebrity life and materialism have further enriched this theme and it is indeed a fertile arena to harvest !.

I have a very turbulent and physical way of working . My intense, passionate affair with Etching and other forms Printmaking has been the most instrumental in uncovering and establishing my true visual ‚voice‚ so to speak. It continues to be a medium that intrigues me and is hugely influential in the way I approach my paintings. I use print techniques qnd tools as well as the brush. I paint with a roller or make marks by printing onto canvas. I bury and flood my surfaces with texture, then dig my images out - excavating and scraping away to carve out and then impregnate the surface again - intent overlaps accident .

I‚ve started to use fabrics either as collage or to print through them. I print impressions from patterned embossed papers to leave traces of memory, fragments creating a mood or to hint or glimpse at the character of someone. Recently more and more fabrics have entered my work - references to fashion and pattern , ie; lace and how it has a multifaceted and yet entirely feminine image in all its guises. The tangle of fabrics, and the knitting of threads, has become a strong metaphor describing the complexities of female friendships. Net curtains - something old fashioned, familiar, safe and homely perhaps, but also parochial and insular, - you can hide behind them.

I want my work to reveal a strong sense of atmosphere and feeling, combining boldness with ambiguity, which projects, sometimes an obvious, but nearly always an unspoken experience.