About Artist - Judith Devons
I am a printmaker and ceramicist based in Leicester. Much of my
print work has explored themes of identity in our multi-cultural society,
inspired by personal memories and collective traditions. I have also been
involved in art-science collaborations, creating abstract images evolving
from my responses to magnified human cells. Most recently, I have been exploring
the theme of shadows and memories.
All my prints are original one-off screen-prints. To make them, I combine hand-made stencils with layers of text, drawings and/or images that have been photographically transferred to screens and often under-painted and over-painted.
Inspiration for my ceramics comes from the organic quality of clay as well as from natural forms such as twigs, shells and fossils that I often impress or inscribe into the surface. Both hand-built and wheel-made, my ceramics sometimes involve the technique of screen-printing on clay.
As well as exhibiting my work in gallery and non-gallery venues in the Midlands and London, I undertake commissions and lead printmaking and ceramics workshops for all ages and abilities in varied community venues.
Background
After working in New York and London as a freelance journalist in art and social history, I moved to Leicester and started a new career. I completed a Fine Arts degree at De Montfort University, specialising in silk-screen printing and ceramics, and then gained further certification in arts practice and teaching.
Now I maintain a balance between personal creativity in my own studios - with ensuing solo and group exhibitions - and teaching print-making and ceramics in community settings and from my home-based studios.
I find it extremely rewarding to work with adults and children at all levels and to encourage and facilitate unexpected expressiveness and creativity.
Identity and Culture Themes
Much of my work has focused on themes of identity. I have layered photographs, images from ancient sources, and fragments of family letters and travel journals to create one-off screen-prints that explore dislocation, memories of home and family, and connections with ancestors and traditions.
An image that I often use symbolically in my work is the pomegranate. Abundant in the land of Israel, containing more seeds than any other fruit and looking like a vessel offering up its contents, the pomegranate is my metaphor for the procreative, nurturing woman and also for the ideals and dreams of the Jewish soul.
Fragments of Hebrew interwoven in my work are parts of prayers that teach the importance of traditions and morality - precepts to be handed down from generation to generation. I express these themes more abstractly using letters of the Hebrew alphabet, each of which has extensive symbolic significance.
Art-Science Themes
My series of art-science screen-prints - abstractions of cellular images - extends a unique collaboration with scientists at the Medical Research Council's Toxicology Unit at the University of Leicester.
I visited the Toxicology Unit and examined a variety of normal and abnormal human cells magnified up to a quarter of a million times using electron microscopy and then selected some to transform into innovative screen-prints. At first, the cells suggested radiating eyes, branching trees, swirling fishes and graceful dancers. Gradually, they evolved into lunar landscapes and muted abstractions. To scientists, however, the images represent neurones, neuronal transmitters, glial cells and apoptotic cells, and they are studied to understand the mechanisms that cause cells to die.
All the prints are one-off works. To make them, I combine hand-made stencils with layers of drawings and images photographically transferred to screens and then over-painted.
Shadows, Memories and Nature
Recently, my interest in identity and nature has led me to develop a new body of work. In my current screen-prints, shadows are superimposed on woodland paths and interior structures - suggesting memories and people looming just out of sight for viewers to interpret in their own personal ways.
My starting point is usually one of more photographs that I edit and transfer to screens photographically. I combine them with hand-made stencils and layers of over-painting so that each of my screen-prints are unique one-off works.
For some of my screen-prints I have started experimentally using leaves, flowers and fabric as stencils. Then I work on the image by applying layers of over-painting and pastel to produce a one-off work.
Community Projects
2007 - Refugee and Asylum Seeker social history projects for the Leicestershire Museum Service. Audio and video interviews; transcriptions; research; writing and designing exhibition booklet.
2005 - Wigston Records Office, Leicestershire. Devised and installed community exhibition on the history and involvement of Jews in Leicester.
1998 - New Walk Museum, Leicester. Devised exhibition on which current one is based to celebrate 100 years of the city's main synagogue. Explained basic concepts and practice of Judaism. Photos, 3-D displays, text, videos, music, quiz sheets.
Publicity
'MRC International visit to China,' feature in MRC Network , Winter 2005/06
'Pioneering Prints', feature artist profile, Leicestershire County Magazine, January 2006
'Art for Health's Sake', University Hospitals of Leicester magazine
'Drawing Inspiration from the Human Cell', University of Leicester eBulletin
www.le.ac.uk/press/ebulletin/outandabout/drawinginspiration.html
‘Art-science collaboration' feature, Leicester Mercury , 6 November 2003
‘In Focus' ceramicist featured in Midland Potters' Association newsletter, 2001