Artist Talk - Holly Birtles

This month's Artist Talk with Photographic Artist Holly Birtles runs in collaboration with the Photoworks Festival .

Holly will discuss the ideas and influences that underpin her practice, exploring themes including river pollution, volcanic eruptions, AI and digital objects, reimagined truths, concealment, and subversion through process. She will examine how these concepts manifest across both digital and analogue outputs, with a particular focus on two bodies of work: Volcano Mother and Fighting Fish.

Volcano Mother represents a pseudo production presenting backstage and rehearsal instances whereby members of the cast contemplate and practise their role as selected volcanoes. Elaborate props are made in which represent volcanic surface and structure; the props are always designed to be wearable outfits. These choreographed performance pieces, explore singing, spoken word and movement. The short performances are recorded through the photographic medium during the staged events. Performances represent volatile emissions of gas, ash, and dust, including inner dialogs linked to eruptions and hot spots.

Fighting Fish reflects on ongoing work inspired by the Thames River and Thames Estuary, where performers choreograph their roles as ‘Thames Monsters.’ In Chennai, she responds to the Adyar and Cooum rivers, drawing parallels of sentimentality, dedication, care, and destruction. The paradox lies in reverence for these sacred sources, contrasted with the toxicity and damage caused by anthropocentric activities. The project Fighting Fish embodies monstrosity, intertwining beauty with the grotesque, haze, waste, life, and death. The concept of ‘fight’ is initially explored through constructed performances, directed body language and costume. The project symbolizes an ecological struggle, whilst it also reflects sentimental and emotional associations with place.

Holly Birtles is a UK (London) based photographic artist. Her practice incorporates performance, prop production, and digital/analogue techniques, often in collaboration with writers, visual artists, and musicians. Her work connects performance to place, exploring personal narratives associated with specific eco- systems and/or geo trauma. Props and performances respond to natural phenomena such as volcanic eruptions; sitters personify specific materials or structures related to the selected sites. Using sound- based performances and tactile props, her works document experiential loss through the photographic image. Recent projects integrate performance and AI into darkroom processes, reflecting on slow violence, ecological crises, myth and sentimentality linked to rivers. Birtles exhibits internationally, often collaborating with artists and writers and is course leader of BA (Hons) Photography at Brighton University.

We look forward to seeing you there!