Lindsay Pickett

Lives and works in London, UK

Artist statement

My main practice involves painting with oils on canvas, linen and board. I start with a basic study of a composition idea, usually in the form of a pencil drawing first, then I take this further as a small watercolour and gauche study then develop it more as the finished oil painting. Painting on relief has also been another way that I have been working whereby I try to create the idea of illusion through clay that is semi-three-dimensional. The clay makes the animals or hybrids look like they are coming alive off the surface in order to create the element of surprise. For finding ideas as inspiration, I use photographs of animals and creatures in landscapes to create a visual reality that can be convincing at times as well as terrifying and especially if I want to get the likeness of a creature that is hybrid or alien looking in someway. I wish to make the impossible, possible. My work explores the themes of animal hybrids caused by either genetic engineering, forced or natural evolution and also I have looked at alien animal wildlife. Themes I have recently explored are what living creatures and wildlife may look like on other worlds. I have also looked at the idea of ‘social rejection and absence’ where the very notion of something that is classed as ‘different’ is soon rejected in both the human world and in the animal kingdom. I am also exploring social exclusion. Indeed, when one animal is different from this rest, it is literally almost rejected straight away by the...

Artwork