Brave Face

2022, ink and gouache on broken eggshells

The Brave Face series explores how we present ourselves to the world and the armour used to hide our vulnerability from others. Makeup acts as the primary armour, painting over and putting our best face forward, but the shape of the eggshells results in distortion, the faces become twisted and strange around the curved surfaces, stretched and pained. They are partly obscured by oyster mushrooms, fungal growths that loom and billow around them, hiding them from us and distracting with colour whilst they feed from below the surface.