Kate Brinkworth
(British, b.1977)
Kate Brinkworth undertook her artistic training at Nottingham Trent University, and graduated in 2000 with first class honours. She rapidly began exhibiting her work, and her first major solo show took place in 2001 at Britart Gallery, London. Her success led to further exhibitions across the country and abroad, and she began featuring regularly in several international art fairs and won numerous awards. These include the Westgate Prize (2004), and a commission from GUS headquarters in Mayfair.
Kate Brinkworth's painting stems from her curiosity in films, particularly those directed by, or in the style of, Hitchcock. She is particularly inspired by effects created though experimentation with focus, and repeatedly photographs her still lifes with various shutter speeds, camera angles, and lighting to find the optimum composition. Brinkworth's style uses the language of film, advertising, and photography to create these unique images; her visits to Las Vegas have developed her interest in the representation of objects associated with vice. Painted in varying degrees of focus, her expert technique deceives the viewer into believing the work is a photograph, due to the realism of her subject matter and style, and the thin application of paint which gives a smooth, glossy finish. It is only on closer inspection that the viewer realises the work is entirely painted by hand.
Brinkworth's works challenge our perceptions of the image; in our contemporary world inundated with visual stimuli, she painstakingly labours over her compositions to make us look at these familiar objects in a new way. In a parallel challenge to contemporary conventions, her technique mirrors the Renaissance mural technique of the 'cartoon', a drawing which would be pricked along the lines and dusted with charcoal to transfer the skeleton of the image to the wall. Brinkworth similarly maps out her photographs onto both sides of sheets of paper and rubs the reverse to move the image onto the canvas. Once the composition is mapped out, she begins working into the picture in oil using her distinctive technique.
Kate Brinkworth lives and works in Birmingham; alongside her studio practice she teaches painting techniques to students in a local college, and holds a long term artist in residence position. She exhibits regularly both in London and internationally, and over recent years she has built a strong reputation in both the primary and secondary markets within the contemporary art scene.
Exhibitions at Alon Zakaim Fine Art:
All Or Nothing, 30 Cork Street, 21 September - 22 October 2010
