Show notes
Ninety-six per cent of Black British adults don’t swim regularly. That's the statistic from the Black Swimming Association that my guest came across while she was deep in research about bodies of water / about what they hold, what they absorb, what they promise.
Phoebe Boswell is a Kenyan-British artist whose work has been shown at the Venice Biennale and in major institutions and collections worldwide.
In this conversation, Phoebe talks about her latest large-scale commission for Art on the Underground, we move through scales of blue, now running alongside the escalators at Notting Hill Gate and Bethnal Green subway stations in London. She shares how she works with communities without extracting from them, why she stopped painting for twenty years and what brought her back, and what she has come to understand about figuration, freedom and the responsibility that comes with the work. You will leave with a deeper sense of what it means to make work that holds rupture and joy at the same time - and the courage it takes not to resolve them.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Phoebe holds two things at once - A figurative practice that she describes as lovemaking - a sustained attention to the body, particularly the Black female body, as a way of truly seeing. And alongside it, a refusal to stay in the language of identity alone.
Making work that holds rupture and joy at the same time isn’t a flaw to be fixed. It’s a way of working: that stays true to pain, history and politics while refusing to let go of tenderness, nuance, and beauty.
Phoebe’s approach to figuration, community and public space asks us to think more deeply about how we see who we work with. What we owe the people in and around our work, not just as subjects or audiences, but as co-holders of meaning.
BEST MOMENTS
“Art became a way of coming back to myself… it was a process of trying to re-see the self that had been kind of shattered. It was proclaiming myself, reminding myself that I’m still here.”
“Art is this place for me to sense, to taste, or to test the borders of my own truth in a way that I don't think is always possible in real life. I think you go through seasons.”
“Trust the porous borders between your projects. To return to what you left, changed. And to keep making work that is for the people in it, before it is for anyone else.”
“I don't want to be free off the back of anyone else.”
EPISODE RESOURCES
https://www.phoebeboswell.com/
https://www.instagram.com/phoebe.boswell/
HOST BIO
With over 35 years in the art world, Ceri has worked closely with leading artists and arts professionals, managed public and private galleries and charities, and curated more than 250 exhibitions and events. She has sold artworks to major museums and private collectors and commissioned thousands of works across diverse media, from renowned artists such as John Akomfrah, Pipilotti Rist, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer and Vito Acconci. Now, she wants to share her extensive knowledge with you, so you can excel and achieve your goals.
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This Podcast has been brought to you by Disruptive Media. https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/