Mary Sewell is a mixed media artist working from her studio at Portland Works a former cutlery factory in Sheffield http://www.portlandworks.co.uk/makers/mary-sewell.
Mary paints using oil paints as well as exploring less traditional material. She takes clay, hessian, string, wax, found and personal objects which she collages together to create paintings and small sculptures. The clay she uses is dug from her allotment and much of the materials she uses is residue from the process of making, She cuts, tears, burns and wraps in a cycle of creating and destroying. Her interest lies in that which is hidden and her practice is a search for clues into those secrets. The objects she makes are evocative of ancient artefacts uncovered from another time and place.
“Only when I give myself space to listen and reflect can I connect with and maybe reveal what is beneath the skin. I am interested in that which is hidden, invisible or unformed and the relationship between that inner and outer space. I believe within, our unconscious presides in another world; a world which exists in tandem with everyday life. Carl Jung describes the collective unconscious as “structures of the unconscious mind which are shared among beings”. According to Jung, “the human collective unconscious is populated by instincts and by archetypes”
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