What Will the Neighbours Think? (2018)
What Will the Neighbours Think? is about the double-take: to look and then look again, the glance followed by the gaze, an illusion that changes from one thing into another — or disappears completely.
The work brings together hand-printed erotic wallpaper, a custom-designed lace voile fabric and personal family history. I grew up with my grandparents on the old Bestwood council estate in Nottingham, and I remember lying in bed shifting my focus on the woodchip wallpaper, making the bits of wood chip protrude and recede into the surface depending on how I held my eyes. That was my first encounter with perceptual shift — with how looking itself can make things change.
The erotic figures in the lace and wallpaper designs are inspired by depictions on a 5th century Greek plate. Hidden inside the pattern, they reveal and conceal themselves depending on how closely you look. My family's connection to the Nottingham lace trade — my great-great-grandfather worked as a lace designer in the Lace Market — gave these designs an unexpected historical resonance. The 'Body Lace' design was originally developed during a year-long residency in the same building he worked in, now the Lace Market Gallery.
This installation was made for the This Class Works exhibition. The lace-inspired fabric is available at The Monkey Puzzle Tree.
