Ta-da
> Other titles I considered for this work were This is me now and Look what you made me do now. > It was taken with Holly Birtles towards the end of a collaboration over several days during which we filmed and took still photos for the Wild Caviar video and print series. There are 4 photos of me with some of the props we used that I have retained as works in themselves. All 4 self-portraits are about my love/hate relationship with paint. They are uncomfortable but the yearning for this sort of work had been with me for years before I found the courage to do it for a camera. I knew Holly Birtles and her work from the Slade where we were in the same tutorial group. In her own practice she also seems to deal with a certain discomfort around the body juxtaposed with painted props. > The weather balloon was a prop that Holly Birtles brought to our collaboration. I found it incredibly sensual to move paint around on and loved working with it. In the end, I felt this need to hide behind it, to obliterate myself with it, replace my sense of self with the object of paint. The gesture is sincere, instinctive but also feels uncomfortably theatrical when I look back at it. The title refers to this deflated sense of being uncomfortably on show.
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