CONTACT
Visual Arts Programme Curator (and Artist Mentor) at Morphē Arts
EDUCATION & TRAINING
2014 - 2016. MA Fine Art, Chelsea College of Art, London
2008 - 2011. BA Fine Art, University of Wales, Abersytwyth
2013. Studio Lighting, London School of Photography
2007 - 2008. Elevate Dance Company (Springs Dance Company Apprenticeship Scheme)
LECTURES
2021. Religion and Art Forum, UAL Arts Chaplaincy Projects and Goldsmiths Department of Art.
2019. "Touch me Not": the Stand-in, the Decoy and the Redeemer, Performance Lecture, Morphē Arts, with Tyrone Isaac-Stuart.
2017. A Study in Scatology & Repulsion, Morphē Arts
2017. Vulnerability, Temporality & Dystopia, Morphē Arts
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2019. Meals for One, Forum Artist Residency (installation)
GROUP EXHIBITIONS & PERFORMANCE
2021. You Shall Only Go Up and Not Down, St John's Church, Keswick. Performance with tyroneisaacstuart
2021. Congregated, Deptford X Fringe, St Nicholas Church
2021. Last Sunset New Sunrise, Alter Us, St John's at Bethnal Green
2020. Traces of An Absent Body, Koppel Project Round Room
2019. Fish, Birds, Fingers and Other Things, Deptford X Fringe
2019. The Taste of Home in the Wandering Body, All Saints Wandsworth
2018. Humble To The Ground, Laban Building Gardens (Trinity Laban), Deptford X Fringe
2018. At The Threshold, hARTslane, New Cross
2018. Paradise Underground, Sugar Cane Bar, Clapham
2018. Between Friends, St Stephen's Walbrook
2017. Show Home, Art Licks Weekend, The Old Police Station (Shortlisted for the Workweek Prize)
2017. ek(stasis), Deptford X Fringe, Archie's Bar, Deptford
2017. Cast of My Shape, 'Peace in it together bit by bit pt 3' Artist Series, 19 Goulston Steet
2016. MA Degree Show, Chelsea College of Art
2016. We/Us, Interim Exhibition, Chelsea College of Art
2015. Human Nature, The Archive Gallery, Haggerston
2015. P is For Process Project Part Time, Chelsea College of Art
2015. Connect & Grow, The Garden Museum
2014. Tangent, MAFA Intro Show, Chelsea College of Art
2014. Stick 'Em Up, HUSK Gallery & Project Space
2013. Two Lines, Inside The White Cube, Trinity Buoy Wharf
2013. Strike Against Art Group Exhibition, The Nunnery Gallery
2012. In Unison, Empty Shop Project, Dorking
2011. Degree Show, The School of Art, Aberystwyth University
2010. Internal Traces, The Aberration Group. Gloucestershire Arts and Crafts Centre
PROJECTS/ RESIDENCIES
2020. Round Room Residency, Koppel Project, The Campus
2019. Forum Artist Residency, Installation
2014. Connect & Grow, Siobhan Davies Dance
2014. Interplay, Interface Arts Scotland, Leith School of Art
2013. Sharing Moving Making, Independent Dance
2013. (Artist Assistant/Intern) Hidden in Plain Sight: Re-Imagining History & Landscape, Nottingham Castle
2013. (Producer/Devised Theatre Collaboration) These Feet, Morphe Arts
2013. (Project/ Publication) Still Moving, Siobhan Davies Dance
2013. Strike Against Art, Bow Arts and Morphe Arts, The Nunnery Gallery
2012. Only Connect Lab, Aberystwyth Arts Centre
2011. Empty Shop Project, Second Hand Dance
2011. (Collaborative Project & Performance) Dwsin y Daith and Rhuddem Dance Company
WRITING
Upcoming. Visual Commentary on Scripture, Kings College London.
2019. Essay on Alastair Gordon, at City and Guilds Residency, London
2019. "Touch me Not": The Stand-In, the Decoy and the Redeemer, performance lecture at Morphe Arts
2019. Exhibition Text, 'Black Stuff', Unit 3 Projects, London (Turps Painters)
2019. Essay on Matt Gee, exhibition at Husk Gallery, London.
2018. AMBIT Magazine, Review of 'Poetics. Trucks. Flood' by Michael Coppelov at Husk Gallery, London
Sarah's work is rooted in the history of collaborative practice between dance and visual art. As an artist and researcher she is interested in developing new methodologies of engagement between art theory and practice, philosophy and theology. Her work manifests as installation and performance utilising a range of processes including casting, woodwork, painting, textiles, film and writing. Sarah has a background in contemporary dance and for the past seven years her work has been underpinned by a conversation between movement research and visual art practice. Her work is centred upon the experience of trauma and loss within the body; the physical and mental relationship with - and longing for - home and for absent people; and how these embodied experiences can be understood through the theological and scriptural concepts of incarnation, resurrection and encounter with God in the body.
Her current work is focused on a (re-)integration of theological thinking into the language of performance art: exploring embodiment in dance through the lens of embodiment in theology: particularly that of Christology. Her writing responds to the the chapter Whole Wounds in performance theorist Peggy Phelan's book Mourning Sex: notably her observations of Caravaggio’s painting, ‘The Incredulity of Saint Thomas’. Sarah's writing elaborates upon the themes of redemption, substitution, trauma and tacit/bodily knowledge as explored in Phelan's text. Following Sarah’s sabbatical research in 2021 her performances and writing have developed to explore orientational metaphors and bodily language within Old Testament/Hebraic scripture, and how these articulate what kind of encounter we can have with God through the language of the body. This language includes that of up and down, ascent and descent, high and low, rise and fall, and left and right.
Our physical body is the site we inhabit in the world. It is battered and bruised: a tangible testimony to what we have known. We carry with us in the body our memories and emotions of everything that has gone before, of everything that has been done to us and which have done. Alluding in part to the Entombment paintings, Sarah's work persistently presents an image of a falling, collapsed and entangled body: utilising tools of repetition, mimicry, and endurance to physically explore grief.