Fee Greening

The foundation of my illustration lies in the sublime and the uncanny. The sublime refers to a form of beauty so exquisite it becomes a supernatural experience in its ability to affect our emotions and actions, a beauty so severe it becomes a wilder, more aggressive experience, leaving us with a feeling of awe and terror. The uncanny derives its terror not from something unknown but something which is old, established in the mind, and has become alienated through the process of repression. Fear of the dark is a theme the uncanny obsessively returns too, its origins deep rooted in childhood but its effect can easily over power adult rationality. 

I use the dark as an environmental context of my research as I explore the origins of nocturnal fear, and nightmares. My recent work explores the ancient characters of the darkness: Christian fears of Lucifer and the demonic, the night hag, the vampyr and the succubus. This year I have studied the original succubus, Lilith, the personification of feminine evil. According to Hebrew legend, Lilith was the first woman created by God out of the dust of the earth as Adam. However their physical equality led to bickering as Lilith would not submit to Adam as she knew them to be made of the same dust. Both refused to lay beneath each other during intercourse because both believed themselves to be the dominant gender. Eventually Lilith eloped from Eden with Lucifer and together they spawned a thousand demonic offspring a day, known as Lilim. To punish her for her wantoness, God killed her demonic children and created Eve out of Adams rib, knowing that she would have to submit because she was made from his own flesh. Lilith is said to avenge her offspring by haunting men as a succubus, lurking in the shadows of bedrooms at night and harvesting the semen of men during erotic nightmares. I am interested in societies continued fascination with female virtue and the disgraced of the fallen woman, the original submissive Eve and the original feminist Lilith.

Predominately I work in dip pen and ink, I am eager to preserve the traditional human element of drawing in a world so enamoured by technology. I graduated from Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design in 2012 and am represented by The Cob Gallery. My previous clients include Island Records, Fortnum & Mason and Faber & Faber.