Project
Postgraduate Fine Art
Postgraduate
Project
Phil Waterworth
Taking a line for a walk looking for a dropped kerb
Postgraduate Fine Art
Postgraduate
Hit the North
Marker pen and pencil on paper 21x30cm, 2020
Phil Waterworth
Taking a line for a walk looking for a dropped kerb

‘The human organism is an atrocity exhibition at which he is an unwilling spectator…’
JG Ballard (The Atrocity Exhibition)

In his current drawings, the circular motifs could refer to various aspects of Phil Waterworth’s immediate environment. A wheelchair user, the wheel shape holds symbolic reference for him, not only in how he gets around but also with regards to his love of music and in particular, vinyl. There are also spiritual connotations that underpin a lot of his work. He is interested in the Zen tradition of Enso drawing where circles are drawn with one or two strokes of the hand. The drawings show the human touch and any mistakes are left in, the atrophy in Waterworth’s hands affecting the marks. Each drawing is a kind of map of a particular moment in time and space. The circle is pertinent also in relation to ideas of nothingness and the void, especially Samuel Beckett’s concept of waiting and nothing actually happening. He notes:

“Spending, as I do, large amounts of time housebound, the subject of boredom comes up in my work and it’s close relation, emptiness”.

Waterworth lives with a debilitating health condition that has profound impact on his day to day life and notions of transience and atrophy are critical to understanding his work.

“Very often I feel as if I am silently watching the demyelination chart its destructive path around my nervous system. Bodily movements such as walking, standing up, cutting food, begin to lapse. Predominantly in a seated position I value upper body movement and its relationship to space, how time values slow down as perimeters close in on me.”

For Waterworth there are political implications of using media that could be considered to be ‘non art’, ‘anti art’ or in a word, ‘cheap’: Marker pens, spray paint, biro pens, duct tape, all materials that are easy to access and assert themselves through their tendency to be temporary and brief. This DIY aesthetic has its roots in Waterworth’s relationship to music, particularly post-punk and acid house, transgressive genres relentlessly questioning upheld tradition and belief.

Waterworth graduated from the university of Central Lancashire with a degree in Fine Art (specialising in time based media) in 1998.  After moving to Sheffield in 2000, he taught art in secondary schools in Doncaster for 13 years before embarking on post graduate study at Sheffield Hallam University in 2018.  As well as being a qualified teacher, he is also trained in teaching meditation to people with chronic pain and other health conditions.

Fail Again, Fail Better
T6(Transmission)
Marker pen and pencil on paper 21x30cm, 2020
T2 (Voodoo Ray)
Marker pen and pencil on paper, 21x30cm, 2020
Amitryptaline (Hospital Drawing)
Watercolour and pen on paper, 20 x 20cm, 2020
Botox (Hospital Drawing)
20 x 20cm, 2020
C1
Marker pen on paper, 21x30cm, 2020
Hit the North
Acrylic, spray paint, collage and duct tape on canvas, 90x60cm
Pregablin (Hospital Drawing)
20 x 20cm, 2020
Rip it up and start again
Acrylic, spray paint, collage and duct tape on canvas, 90x60cm
Skolstrejk
Collage on paper, 29x42cm, 2020
Tizanidine (Hospital Drawing)
20 x 20cm, 2020
Piss
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Taking a line for a walk looking for a dropped kerb
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Hit the North
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