Sїan Rees Astley

b. 1992, Bangor, Wales

2012-2015 BA Fine Art, Coleg Menai, Bangor

Recent exhibitions

Group shows:
2015 ‘Empower’, Bocs, Caernarfon
2014-15 ‘Encounter 1’, MOSTYN, Llandudno
2014 ‘Sbectrwm’, Galeri, Caernarfon

Awards and Residencies:
2013 The Gwyn and Mary Owen Prize, Galeri, Caernarfon
2013 The Peter Prendergast Drawing Prize, Coleg Menai, Bangor

Artist’s Statement

Materials are freed from their properties and associations and returned to their essence. The mundane nature of the materials relates from personal and cultural experiences.

The materials are chosen for their sensual qualities and the potential to take the abstracted and deconstructed to create sculptural works in the round and wall based works. Although the predetermined associations and properties of the material are changed; the memory embedded within the material still holds true. The aim is to create a personal and poetic narrative within the work, this narrative is almost always abstracted in the titling of the work, and the juxtaposition of materials leading the viewer elsewhere.

The installation of the sculptures within a space is orchestrated – each element, material, space and void are considered between and around the physical objects to create a composition which lead the viewer through and around the space.

Transformation and repetition are key processes within the work; material is collated, abstracted and transformed to create something so removed from its initial state that it is unrecognisable, yet its presence undeniably asks you to look again.