Noelle Genevier (born in 1958) lives, works and studies in Surrey. She is recently completed a Fine Art MA but up until 2016 had little knowledge or experience of contemporary fine art.  Genevier has had several solo and joint exhibitions over the past five years: an installation for the National Trust, Dapdune Wharf, Guildford, an exhibitor in What Do We Know Anyway, Bloc Project, Sheffield, Edge to Edge, at the Cello Factory, London, public art exhibition with Surrey Hills Arts, an 18 month solo residency with Hounslow arts and joint exhibition at the James Hockey Gallery, Farnham.

The work is looking at entanglement and the embedding of old knowledge into new concepts creating new systems with which to view the future. The flow of ideas back and forth into the past, through the present into the future weaving new stories. The entwining of technology with historical wisdom and practises can be seen in the work. It looks at the resilience of plants and what can be learnt from this.

Through the unseen the work reflects on the natural world using the medium of collage, screen printing and digital design. The work looks at the complex connections and associations we have with our surroundings. It teases out the layers of information that are contained in a single viewpoint or image and recombines them speculatively. It looks in depth, beyond what is physically possible and at underlying constructs of things which are familiar to us. The work looks at the unseen: things that are seen but not noticed – veins on a leaf the sewn stitches on a seam, things that cannot be seen with the naked eye, abstract things: ideas, thoughts, dreams. Things that are out of the line of sight on the periphery of our vision. The areas out of focus in a photograph, the space between what we see, its translation in our mind to its definition – the conglomeration of shapes and colours that become interpreted by language, experience and knowledge. It considers the idea of reality; is the thing we see actually what it is?

The conventional view we have of things and how we communicate with them is challenged in the work which is influenced by Jane Bennett’s Vibrant Matter; in which she asks the viewer to envisage creating a new way of looking at the world. A view which does away with the hierarchical idea that humans are the only agents on the planet. The work embodies Jane Bennett’s idea that we are all interconnected as humans and with our environment. All things (human, living, non-human and non-living) are made up of several parts each part working to maintain a whole and to stay connected to other parts this can be seen in the collages where each image supports is neighbour through colour, texture and subject matter. These interlocking networks (or patterns) and interconnection are something that can be found in the work.

The interdisciplinary practice includes installations, collage, screen printing, zine production and digital design.

CV & Education

Historical Futures (a series)

The images come from a collage which was investigating our connections with nature and the past and where a combination of present and historical knowledge might lead mankind. Images of water and rock combined with tapestries of nature and hessian. Rocks are the foundation of our planet were created millions of years ago and have changed little in this work they represent stability; what we know. Water a more fickle element which is constantly recreating itself through the water cycle represents the uncertainty of the future and what we don't know. The tapestries and hessian represent human's their involvement with the environment and each other. The images have been transferred to a vinyl print and placed on acrylic plates, the out-of-focus imagery accentuates our lack of vision of the past and the future this is amplified by the reflections of the prints. The reflections and repeating themes emphasise the different views we have of the past, present and future depending on our perspective but also draw attention to Jane Bennett’s theory that we are all interconnected. The black stands, traditionally used for books ground the pieces and ask the question "What is it that we know?"

Acrylic Plate with Vinyl Print Attached (sitting in a book stand)

19.5x21x14cm