In the studio with… Rebecca Harper

How long have you been at APT?

5 years now! I first joined APT in 2018 having being Awarded the Ryder Project Space Residency (a year-long partially subsidised studio and a show). I got accepted just as I left Turps Art School and the following year in 2019 I was fortunate enough for a space to become permanently available, so I applied again and have since been selected as a longer term studio member at APT studios.  

(I now sit on the Gallery Committee, and have recently been a Mentor for a recent graduate through the Fenton Arts Award, which gifts the artist both a mentorship, a fully funded studio and a solo show for a year at APT). 

Describe APT in three words...

Community, Collaboration, Support 

What is your practice and how do you like to work in your studio? 

Practice:  I am a figurative artist working predominately with Drawing into Painting. Much of what I make is autobiographical, and frames expressions of ‘being’. This can manifest within an unfolding, wondering, allegoric commentary on the locations that I inhabit and but also of those which inhabit me through; life, personal/cultural memory, mythology, narrative, art history, psychoanalysis. A diaspora framing is ever present where I am interested in addressing a space in which to look compassionately at challenging the often contradictory positions inherent within identity and belonging, and to therefore record the multiplicity of paradoxes inherent in themes of otherness, representation and displacement.” 

Studio: An average working day in studio 1.1 starts for me by popping the kettle and Radio 4 on late morning, I love this part of my day! Over a coffee I will spend time looking afresh at the work from the night before, sitting on the futon looking at collected and found imagery, and reading artist books.  

My process will generally be to start by gathering lots of imagery together; be it drawing from life or imagination, found imagery, screenshots on my phone from social media, art historical references, high and low imagery. I make lots of small drawings which re-work multiple references, as fragmented/ reconstructed worlds (just enough) that I question that state of reality within the image. Subsequently I will make multiple smaller studies in paint intended to inform the making of my larger works.  

 Initially I start a larger work on the wall, loosely painting a rough outline on canvas in order to get somewhat of a road map, before I pull it off and paint the remainder on the floor. Un-stretched it acts much like a carpet for a week or so, I sometimes have my tea break on it. Materially I like to work on un- primed canvas because it behaves more like paper. The paint won't drip and will instead become absorbed into the surface of the painting, seeping into the skin. 

The limitations of the distorted image mean that I can only work on patches at a time which appear totally abstracted whilst I am on the floor, so I work like a patchwork, building out in paint until eventually the work goes back up on the wall at the end, and I see the entirety of the Image afresh for the first time. I enjoy that engagement in the making process and the element of surprise at the end.  

This all gives me a freedom in the making. Working on the floor feels more intimate in the way a sketchbook does when you handle it closely or close it away. It feels less precious, the fact that it feels more throwaway and much more like childhood play helps the paintings to free themselves of this expectation of making an oil ‘painting’. There is nothing more daunting for me than seeing a fully primed stretched canvas on the wall awaiting the first mark.  

 I like to get into my flow- state and tend to focus very intensely over 8 hours if I can over blocks of time. So I like to have food supplies and coffee breaks at the ready to help me to stay in the zone often until about 8pm in the evening! 

Which artists have influenced you?

(I always line up the books around me on the floor whilst I work) All of which are feeding into the work -  if not directly then thematically or at a subconscious level where references are located in my peripheral vision. Some references will be sitting there in the studio keeping me company for a long time like grand art parents, and others more fleetingly, but it feels really important that I am not alone and having a continual dialogue in relation to the language of other artists drawings and paintings.  

Lately in the studio I have had many books open, particularly painters; Edvard Munch is always there, Louise Bourgeois paintings from her youth, a retrospective book on Chagall’s lithographs, Close ups of Bruegels landscapes, the Bloomsbury Group and the artifacts from their painted house, Paula Modersohn- Becker’s landscapes, Paula Rego’s mythological prints, Eric Ravilliou’s interiors, Kai Althoff paintings and drawings, Kitaj, and Lubaina Hamide’s Tate publication.  

What is the most unusual thing someone might find in your studio?

A Diamanté Dustpan and brush from Deptford high street….. and soon to be ‘Doron’ my Bernese Mountain dog puppy who will no doubt be popping in to keep me company!  

Scroll down for details of Rebecca’s work currently on show.