Chloe Windsor

Over the past few years I’ve been making a body of work linking the physics of energy transference in phosphorescent and fluorescent objects to metaphors in religious art. I’m very drawn to the idea that scientific theories can be fantastical and wondrous rather than cold, hard objective fact. Isaac Newton has been a pivotal figure for me in my research, as a rigorous scientist who sought empirical evidence of spiritual matters. Physical and chemical processes of change led me to research the stories of Narcissus and Pygmalion from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, finding the links in these stories between art, sex, the Self and immortality that have renewed relevance in the age of the internet. For my final show work I have explored the science behind Victorian optical illusions and phantasmagoria, and burgeoning hologram technology in relation to figurative sculpture. I have used traditional sculpture techniques that are outmoded in contemporary art institutions (clay modelling and plaster casts) yet still reverberate through our ideas about what sculpture is and how it should look.