A Recent History - Artist's Statement | Sophie Gralton
A Recent History On a trip to Paris few years ago, Sophie Gralton found in a floor to ceiling bookshop, a hard cover bound catalogue dedicated to 17th Century Dutch portraits of children. She was immediately drawn to the cool austerity of the palette and the demeanour of the sitters. Young children dressed in stiff, oppressive clothing, more like small adults rather than children. She lugged the heavy book back to Australia.A couple of years later she was photographing her children in a section of her house where the cold south light created an atmosphere which reminded her of the Dutch paintings. Initially, using her own girls as models, she placed them in poses similar to that of the 17th century tradition but with animals and birds with a contemporary Australian feel.As an avid collector of things old and discarded, she began ‘burying’ items in the grounds of the paintings to perform as a memory trigger or a vague reference to times past. Old bookplates, garments, linoleum and manilla tags are submerged below the surface, transposing item long forgotten and obsolete to play an integral role in the work.Gralton consistently removes the gaze by cropping the eyes, so the result is not a portrait; more a fleeting moment, or a memory; the body language of ’everychild’. She is attracted to the genre partly because traditionally paintings with children as subject are seen as the lowest form of painting second to still life. This derisive attitude appeals to her.After majoring in painting at the National Art School, she studied under Charlie Sheard and honed some traditional painting techniques but does not align herself to any particular strict process. ‘I am an intuitive painter and not particularly intellectual. I don’t theorise much about colour or process. The work becomes too self conscious if I am trying too hard; spontaneity and experimentation can be lost. If I capture something early on in the painting process I try to avoid over working. I love seeing underpainting, earlier mark making and the mismarks coming through. I like there to be some memory of process.Although she lives in Cremorne, she works from a large artist’s collective in an industrial warehouse space nestled behind the busy working docks of Rozelle. Her studio is filled with garments, worn shoes, rusting trikes and musty storybooks scoured from country towns across Australia.A conceptual artist who also works from the same studios once remarked, ‘Your space has such a sense of abandonment.’ When Sophie responded with, ’Oh that sounds so terribly sad.’ She corrected herself. ‘No, you misunderstand me……I mean more like things that have been rescued..’ This is true. An old 50’s rocking horse found on the street in Darlinghurst, rows of little leather shoes gifted by an antique dealer in Mildura and garments, some of which were the artist’s own as a child fill the large space. The models often wear this clothing when posing for paintings.
