VICTORIA McALPINE

Heavily influenced by a childhood immersed in her father’s eccentric collections, from voodoo dolls to 18th Century farm implements, Victoria McAlpine creates strange worlds with ambiguous narratives, drawn to ideas around magic and transformation. She often explores themes associated with myth and fairytale, creating uncanny spaces to make the familiar appear unfamiliar and evoke a sense of unease. Victoria is a multi-disciplinary artist, working with an eclectic range of materials including wood, bronze, clay and textiles. She is relentless in her experimentation with processes, mediums and materials in order to communicate her intention and concept. The ideas will dictate the form and the materials used. Light plays an essential role in her work, allowing her to examine the threshold between interconnected worlds: the imagined and the real, the public and the private - often with underlying themes of mystery, dread and threat.  Victoria has long been interested in our connection to the natural world and this is often reflected in her work. Nature is at once a safe haven and a place of impending danger – a duality that is explored in many of her projects, often with a narrative theme. Forests in particular are a recurring image in her practice as places of enchantment and unease.