Emma O'Hara
Bio
Artist Statement
Following a recent residency in Rimbun Dahan Arts Centre in Kuala Lumper, O’Hara’s new work builds on her personal experience of living and working in the jungle to generate sensory explorations of imagined paradises. These boldly colourful and abstracted dreamscapes exist outside of time and space, completely immersing the viewer in the Artist’s vision and generously granting them access to her own experiences, ambitions and motives.
O’Hara’s emotionally charged works, depict lush and verdant, fantasy landscapes evoking a sense of reverie, nostalgia and wanderlust through vivid works on paper and ceramic vessels. Her confidence with colour and her daring use of strong abstract shapes paired with the spontaneity of the mark-making remind the viewer that this is a dream, a fluid, shifting space that is at once eternal and fleeting. The various scales and materials of the works add to the dreamscape with landscapes growing and shrinking becoming ferociously lucid or subtly delirious. The work conjures the memory of a landscape rather than a specific site, a gentle but poignant reminder of the precarious nature of our own natural environment and our obligation to protect it.
Website www.emmaohara.com
Instagram @emmaoharaartist
Membership: Short Term Studio