The ageing body and society’s attitude towards older people has been the subject of my work for the past five years. The history of art is also the history of understanding our bodies and, in turn, what it is to be human. The body has often been used as a vehicle through which artists question the society in which they live. The body is a source of messages and stories.
We are great interpreters of each other – we invent narratives (often incorrect) of the people we see and meet. I want to show human deterioration but also want to look at how we invent images of ourselves in order to understand ageing.
Man in Pieces is a work in progress combining screen prints and drawing. Here I am looking at how the exterior of the body can reflect the internal changes and decay that ageing brings.
All images © 2011 Clare Winter. All rights reserved.