Lauren Cameron Quinn (She/Her)
In paint, I focus on the manipulation of flesh, the extremities of anatomy, and notions of the grotesque, a combination of tight personal observations. I am drawn back repeatedly to how the body can be totally brutalized, broken down, peeled back and stripped bare, all the while holding the potential to being moulded and pieced back together.
My work combines large scaled theatrical atmospheric oil paintings where I focus on thick application of paint and physical mark making. In their proportion they confront and distort, these are paired with smaller, intimate pieces that utilise fragmented compositional elements which require the viewers own intimate knowledge of the body.
The use of featureless background creates an unsettling void of nothingness, figures suspended in an empty chamber, narrative unclear if their pain has just started or drawing to a close, leaving the viewer in an uncomfortable position, forcing them to bare witness to the brutalization but feed into the curiosity of what it means to ruin and destroy, what lies beneath the skin.
Humans are susceptible to puncture and cut, and in the end, like all organic matter, we’ll spoil. Whatever else we are, we’re meat.
Both historical and contemporary artists have influenced my practice, particularly those who intimately explore the human figure and the human condition. The work included by Francis Bacon and Goya, particularly their own honest, visceral portrayal of the human body are crucial points or inspiration.
Use of film is also very prevalent in my work, the ability to not only manipulate a composition from a still but also to take from multiple sources to create a new composition.
BLOOD OF THE BEASTS
Heavily inspired by the French short film, Blood of the Beasts (Le Sang des bêtes) by Georges Franju, this painting offers a more abstract viewing of the brutal reality of abattoirs, while employing a disarmingly beautiful visual style.
Franju himself wasn’t necessarily interested in the subject of the abattoirs themselves, but more so the ideas of the brutalist environment of the abattoir and how it countered and transformed the picturesque and serene landscapes of Paris, the brutal reality of the working man in the abattoirs paired with the often surreal disarming shots, attracted me to this film and subsequent creation of this work.
This work depicts the aftermath of an almost barbaric slaughtering of a cow, it leaves out the process itself, the stunning, skinning and ultimate slaughtering of the animal. It allows for reflection, the animal, the process and the slaughterhouse itself is taken out of context and all that’s left is a blood soaked alleyway – a way of measurement to the sheer amount of slaughter.
The painting is extremely reductive. Any sense of perspective is diminished, allows for an almost distorted viewing.
BLOOD OF THE BEASTS
95″ X 53″
Oil on Canvas
(2022)
Project Links
HUNG OUT TO DRY (SLAUGHTERED AND CURED)
A more conventional take of the abattoir, this work is more so focused on the process itself, a step in the skinning and curing process of meat.
This work, has a strong theatrical atmosphere a large, momentous amalgamation of meat almost floating in a featureless rich background. The pull and of the meat is contextually given by the chains keeping it grounded in a sense of realism where the meat itself isn’t hanging its floating, yet gravity still pulls the inners out of the body the weight and give of the meat is still seen.
HUNG OUT TO DRY (SLAUGHTERED AND CURED)
48″ X 70″
Oil on Canvas
(2022)
Project Links
DEADSTOCK (HUMAN TOTEM)
Heavily Inspired by ‘Hannibal’ (2013-2015), this work wanted to encapsulate the throwaways of meat, the reject pile.
A pile of amalgamated flesh, piled atop of each other – tightly wrapped and bound just as you would with deadstock from any abattoir. Paired with ‘HUNG OUT TO DRY (SLAUGHTERED AND CURED) these two paintings play off of each other, they again show a process and end or beginning to a work day – a sense of discomfort by a niggling hesitate to find out more, why and how this came to be.
DEADSTOCK (HUMAN TOTEM)
48″ X 70″
Oil on Canvas
(2022)
Project Links
PRIME CUTS
FEET (WEE WILLIE WINKIES)
SUBMISSION
‘SUBMISSION’, was heavily inspired by body suspension – a form of body modification – the act of rigging a human body and hanging it from hooks, piercing the body.
Taking the act of body suspension and putting it in a dark featureless background, the composition and context changes, it makes for a uncomfortable viewing experience, the act of piercing the skin and being able to visually see the weight, the strain of the skin working against the hook. The viewer is uncomfortable of being presented a scene like this, the question of consent and non consent is present.
SUBMISSION
16″ X 20″
Oil on Canvas Board
(2022)
