Artists Statement…
Angela Edwards is a contemporary painter who strives to make sense of the digital age and mass media imagery. Her work combines digital images and oil paint or charcoal.
The blurring in her work is used to express the quick pace at which we view digital images. Often featuring figures in a space her focus is not concerned with the specificity of who is being featured and more to do with the feeling of surfing the web. She will often start with a dark background symbolising the blank digital screen, she then enables the paint to create a highlighted tonal image which slowly comes into focus.
The digital era has meant that we are bombarded by images 24 hours a day and because of this we become de-sensitised and removed from reality. By translating images from the screen into the ancient medium of oil paint Angela hopes to bring new weight and permanence to them, creating and capturing a moment that would otherwise be lost.
The common thread throughout Angela’s work is that of Home, be it her home, commuters on their way home or the recent mass movement of people and refugees searching for a new home.
Although painting is at the forefront of what Angela does, photography plays a large role in her process and she will combine and re-photograph images grabbed from the screen or just freeze framing a subject that has moved her to paint.
Like most artists her practice is constantly evolving and changing, this helps to keep the work contemporary and fresh.
This body of work uses the photographic effect of Bokeh to help to abstract the images.
