Liz Gridley Beautiful Bizarre Artist Directory member provides some fascinating insights into her practice and experience as figurative painter, as she responds to the questions below:
- What are your goals as an artist?
- What do you struggle most with as an artist?
- What was the most helpful feedback you ever received?
- How do you approach the challenge of staying relevant and current in the rapidly changing world of contemporary art?
What are your goals as an artist?
I think as I’ve matured in my arts practice, I’ve shifted and transformed a lot, I have for so so long been in pursuit of the craft – the finish, the skill. I still am but now that my work stands stronger, I have more compulsion to have my work speak and create conversation. In 2024 I started working within the Deathcare space, at first researching but now actively creating work that questions our roles in the deaths of others – spreads death literacy and acceptance of the labours so particularly western culture can emerge out of the ‘death as taboo’ space. I have goals to integrate my paintings with events and discussions such as my 2025 ‘Death Cafe’ at Beinart Gallery during my show ‘Still Bodies: Dialogues of Deathcare’ and continue these conversations with people as my paintings open these doors.
What do you struggle most with as an artist?
My gut reaction is to say time! It’s my first year with a studio space that’s outside of my home, and this has been wonderful to allow me to focus completely on what I’m doing when I’m working there, but the compulsion to live two lives at once (the artist and the home/family life) means I am constantly wishing for more time, there’s just always more I want to be doing and it’s hard to keep in check alongside what I’ve been accomplishing.
What was the most helpful feedback you ever received?
I was once approached by one of my collectors and told that they could ‘feel’ my painting. That is the emotion, the passion, and the narrative had all come together to create power. This power is one that im so grateful to have had pointed out as it allowed me to break out of my self imposed restrictions of technique and learn more. I will always want to learn more about the language of paint – the act of turning colourful muds into illusions of real space and people on flat surfaces will always amaze me. But knowing that the power of those three elements (emotion, my passion and narrative) allowed the collector to feel the paintings impact so fiercely is now my absolute dream outcome in every piece.
How do you approach the challenge of staying relevant and current in the rapidly changing world of contemporary art?
I think it’s natural now in the huge scope of EVERYTHING you can see people making online, that you can assume there will be others who make work similar to yours in technique or theme. It’s really unavoidable, and fighting that battle is exhausting. I approach being authentic, making work I am proud to stay with and stand behind much more fulfilling as a challenge. Similar to many other artists I’m sure I’ve made pieces that I *think* are what people/audience want – but now I know that when I focus of what is authentically and truly what my mind is passionate about, that this translates as being relevant – I could not feel this strongly about these portrait and figures and objects and it feel irrelevant at the same time. That’s not even touching on the fact that Deathcare will always be relevant, death does have a 100% success rate for humans after all…
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