membership / artist member

David Kefford

http://www.davidkefford.com
download cv here

biography

David Kefford was featured in Contemporary Art Society's ARTfutures 2008 held at Bloomberg SPACE, London.

statement

Drawing and Sculpture have underpinned my practice for the past 10 years. I approach making my work with an inventive and imaginative spirit, employing an everyday resourcefulness and economy of means. I reclaim rubbish from the streets, buy cheap items from charity shops, plunder internet sites and receive donations from friends and family - making do and getting by with the stuff in the world as I find it now.

These non-hierarchical objects are then re-configured into new hybrid things with uncanny sensibilities, which transcend their humble origins. They are usually presented as provisional installations in both gallery settings and off-site locations. When working in such large public spaces I have sought out a level of risk-taking to test the limits of what I feel to be my comfort zone.

Essentially, I am interested in how the work I create can be used as vehicles to signify personal communication (in the 3rd person). I deliberately project my own subjectivity, both physically and emotionally, during every stage of the making process, enabling a sense of intimacy and transparency to emerge. Low-tech, DIY processes such as cutting, binding, wrapping and slicing are applied to alter and re-arrange familiar objects. Eclectic materials become stretched and nailed into walls or bound tight with tape, whilst others sag and droop down a wall, hang in space or grow upwards from the floor. Often my work can simultaneously appear beautiful, funny, up-beat, painful, tragic and sad and is presented in precarious states of coming together and falling apart.

Shapes of bodily references and sexual organs are ever present. Mysterious and indeterminate pieces appear saturated with peculiar texture, wetness and viscosity bestowing suggestions of age, life, history and character. Eccentric forms are imbued with contradictory, human characteristics and emotions such as isolation, embarrassment, anxiety, violence, failure, vulnerability, mutual support, sensitivity, bravery and strength. There is a fine balance between humour and disgust in the work I make and a conflict between seduction and repulsion, pathos and alienation.

- David Kefford, 2009