The Residency:
Project Based Residencies at Griffin Gallery are shorter residencies offering artists studio space, materials and specialised knowledge. Artists are encouraged to develop innovative projects focussed on the interaction, composition or application of Fine Art materials.
'During my residency at Griffin I will be focusing on fading of paint. With the help of the Colart Innovation and Development Laboratory, I will be making paint from the same fugitive red pigment that Rothko used in his Seagram Murals and comparing it in artificial aging tests with more stable Winsor and Newton paints to get an idea of how they will look together after years of aging. This will help me to make paintings in which pigments of different lightfastness are combined so that some elements fade and some become more apparent over time.'
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Sam Hodge:
'My artwork deals with the transformation of materials over time; new forms and patterns emerging from physical processes such as erosion, fracture and flow. I use painting and printmaking to draw attention to the way objects – particularly manmade objects - are transformed by these natural processes, their original function often obscured and their similarity to geological and biological forms becoming more apparent. I am interested in how we respond to these changes. Do we attempt to prevent, reverse, accept or venerate them? Or just chuck the damaged thing in the bin.
In my painting, I allow the paint to flow, erode and fracture as it dries, responding to the patterns that emerge. I would like to extend this interaction with the dynamic properties of paint over a longer timescale. Encouraging paint’s tendency to continue to change slowly; for example fading, cracking, wrinkling and discolouring after it is ‘finished’ and on display. Something traditionally regarded as bad behaviour; the result of bad formulation or technique.'
EDUCATION
Post-graduate diploma in Conservation of Easel Paintings, Courtauld Institute of Art, London University
BA hons in Natural Sciences, New Hall, Cambridge University
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