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Painting (MA)

Dionne Sparks

Born in London, Dionne is an artist and educator, whose practice circles questions of histories, temporality and embodied knowing through abstraction and the transformation of materials. She gained a First-Class BA Hons in Fine Art from Liverpool John Moores University before completing the MA Painting Programme at the Royal College of Art. 

Writing and speaking engagements extend her practice. She was a collective member of Feminist Arts News magazine and contributed an essay to Passion: Discourses on Blackwomen’s Creativity, ed. Maud Sulter.

Dionne spoke as part of a discussion panel on the occasion of Maud Sulter: The Centre of the Frame, an exhibition from the New Hall Art Collection, Murray Edwards College, University of Cambridge. She contributed to a panel discussion at the Fruit Market, Edinburgh, addressing the question: to what extent Pindell’s abstractions, and abstraction in general, can be political. View Dionne's panel contribution here.

A blog written for the Liverpool University's Victoria Gallery and Museum, revisits her work, Conversations, acquired for the University of Liverpool’s collection in 1990 and traces the trajectory of her work from then to her current practice.

Dionne is a recipient of The Basil H. Alkazzi Scholarship Award 2021.

Woman reaches to manipulate a textiles wall piece of dyed and painted fabrics, draped and stitch to create dramatic 3-dimensions

Working in series through linked bodies of work, I circle questions of histories, temporality and embodied knowing. What is it to move through this world and make stuff? To push through accumulated materials and bend them? Probing the edge. The shifting between fingers, the moving limbs. The elusive horizon fluttering, and the thing is never done.

Ranging from flat palimpsestic ‘blackboard’ paintings, draped textile installations, to sound and photographic experiments, marks and gestures loop through the work forming an expanding conversation in which identities are always forming. 

To animate the work I employ the haptic, song and writing to provide a texture and methodology. The work is a space of reflection, conversation, and agency. It is a gesture in the world. A way to leave a trace. 


‘The door signifies the historical moment which colours all moments in the Diaspora’, Dionne Brand, A Map to the Door of No Return

Grey painting with coloured collage shapes rising in a v-shape. Subtle marks & text reading: River Cross
River Cross, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, collage, carbon, pigment on poly/ cotton, 112.5cm x 128cm x 2.5cm
Detail from River Cross painting. Deep grey washes, gestural pencil-like makes overlaid with wiggly collages gestures.
Detail, River Cross, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, collage, carbon, pigment on poly/ cotton
Detail from River Cross painting. Deep grey washes, gestural pencil-like marks, writing reads: River Cross, overlaid collages.
Detail, River Cross, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, collage, carbon, pigment on poly/ cotton
Detail of blue painting with black ink and  brightly coloured collaged abstracted shapes rising in a v-shape.
Detail, They Become Everything: Two Wings, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, carbon, collage, on poly/ cotton
Blue painting with black ink and brightly coloured collaged abstracted shapes rising in a v-shape.
They Become Everything: Two Wings, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, carbon, collage, on poly/ cotton, 112.5cm x 128cm x 2.5cm
Washes of blue, purple and pinks. Hand gesture marks across surface.  Small collaged bright green embryonic shapes at bottom.
Mystic Ocean: One More River, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, pigment, collage, on poly/ cotton, 112.5cm x 128cm x 2.5cm
Washes of blue, purple and pinks. Hand gesture marks across surface.  Small collaged bright green embryonic shapes at bottom.
Mystic Ocean: One More River, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, pigment, collage, on poly/ cotton, 112.5cm x 128cm x 2.5cm
Dark grey washes with black ink marks across surface. Small marks and collage in bright greens and subtle blues.
Detail, Trembling with the Abyss, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, pigment, collage on poly/ cotton, 112.5cm x 128cm x 2.5cm
Grey washes with delicate black lines like musical staves. Hand marks in subtle red with lively white squiggles like writing.
Detail, Island Moan, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, pigment on poly/ cotton, 112.5cm x 128cm x 2.5cm
Grey washes with delicate black lines like musical staves. Hand marks in subtle red with lively white squiggles like writing.
Island Moan, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, pigment on poly/ cotton, 112.5cm x 128cm x 2.5cm
Dark grey washes with black ink marks across surface. Small marks and collage in bright greens and subtle blues.
Trembling with the Abyss, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, pigment, collage on poly/ cotton, 112.5cm x 128cm x 2.5cm
Purple pink washes with iridescent stone-like shapes floating in lower half. Pink squiggles across the surface like writing.
Shimmer, 2023, hand cream, ink, acrylic, pigment, collage on poly/ cotton, 112.5cm x 128cm x 2.5cm
Black washes on ink with lively hand gestures in resit. Looping white chalk over the surface. The word hallelu appears.
Hallelu, 2022, hand cream, ink, acrylic, pigment on poly/ cotton, 90cm x 115cmx 2.5cm
An installation photograph of three paintings of the 12 Generations series
12 Generations: Letters to the Dead - Installation

The series, 12 Generations: Letters to the Dead, is a personal meditation on the legacy of slavery. Gesture, the haptic and body-memory drive these ‘Letters’. In this intimate conversation the past operates in the present and echoes into the future.

Colourful dyed and painted fabric. Layered and draped in 3-dimensions over a reclaimed hardwood frame.
Unfold You, 2023, clothing, fabric, procion dye, batik, transfer dye, acrylic, stitch & reclaimed hardwood, 140cm x 110cm x 15cm
Colourful dyed and painted fabric. Densely layered and draped in 3-dimensions over a reclaimed hardwood frame.
Hold You, 2023, clothing, fabric, procion dye, batik, transfer dye, acrylic, stitch & reclaimed hardwood, 110cm x 180cm x 20cm
Colourful textiles, clothes and dyed canvas draped and stitched. Draped into 3-dimensions to create volume.
Horizon Unfolding, 2022, clothing, canvas fabric, procion dye, acrylic and stitch, 150cm x 200cm
Colourful dyed and painted fabric. Densely layered and draped in 3-dimensions in long shape, over a reclaimed hardwood frame.
Drape You, 2023, clothing, fabric, procion dye, batik, transfer dye, acrylic, stitch & reclaimed hardwood, 150cm x 97cm x 15cm
Colourful textiles, blue, pink, yellow, clothes and dyed canvas draped and stitched. Draped into 3-dimensions to create volume.
Blow into the Future, 2023, clothing, fabric, procion dye, batik, transfer dye, acrylic & stitch, 150cm x 200cm
Colourful textiles, reds, denim, clothes and dyed canvas draped and stitched. Draped into 3-dimensions to create volume.
Into the Wild, 2022, clothing, fabric, procion dye, acrylic & stitch, 200cm x 250cm
Body-like mass made of layer and draped colourful fabrics. In front of frame on wall from reclaimed hardwood.
Emerge, 2023, fabric, procion dye, batik, tranfer dye, acrylic, stitch, tights, wadding & mild steel bar, 180cm x 50cm x 50cm
Green layered textiles draped in front of purple and black abstracted painting with hand marks.
Studio experiment. Textiles and painting.
Colourful textiles, blue, pink, yellow, clothes and dyed canvas draped and stitched. Draped into 3-dimensions to create volume.
Blessed, 2023, clothing, fabric, procion dye, batik, transfer dye, acrylic & stitch, 180cm x 210cm x 20cm

When reflecting on Coltrane’s Interstellar Space, Dionne Brand speaks about the importance of Black artists ‘blowing into the future’ (Brand). These Textiles Paintings and Installations explore my interest poiesis, futurity and sending word. I think of them as a ‘gesture to another place, a wild place’ (Halberstam).

Three large abstract colourful paintings installed in studio. Collaged with textiles and stitch. Cosmic, flowers. Draped.
Zabat Homage (WiP), 2022, acrylic, procion dye, paper and fabric
Batik-like colourful painting. Layers shapes of shards and ovals in turquoise, greens, purples and reds.
(Detail) Phalia: Too Beautiful to Behold (WiP), 2022, acrylic, dye, paper, stitch & fabric on canvas, 180cm x 160cm x 5cm
Batik-like colourful painting off stretcher. Layers shapes of shards and ovals in turquoise, greens, purples and reds.
Phalia: Too Beautiful to Behold (WiP), 2022, acrylic, dye, paper, stitch & fabric on canvas, 180cm x 160cm x 5cm
This work in progress painting acts in call and response to Erato in Sulter’s Zabat photographic series
Erato: Keep Ringing, 2022, acrylic, procion dye, paper, stitch and fabric on unstretched canvas, 180cm x 160cm x 5cmThis painting acts in call and response to Erato in Sulter’s Zabat series. I sat for Sulter’s photograph and am represented as the muse of lyric poetry. I began this work on my birthday which was also the day bell hooks died. While making the work I listen to hooks in conversation with other scholars. I think of the meditation on her legacy as finding its way into the work, becoming a tribute.

The Zabat Homage is a series of paintings in conversation with the work of the Scottish-Ghanaian artist, Maud Sulter. In her photographic series, Zabat, she depicts contemporary creative Black women as the nine muses. The series has personal resonance for me as I am depicted as Erato. The ‘notion of the disappeared’ (Sulter) runs through her work. In Zabat Homage I engage with her legacy, exploring notions of memory, kinship, time-travel and embodied knowing.

Medium:

acrylic, procion dye, paper, stitch and fabric on unstretched canvas

Size:

various

The Basil H. Alkazzi Scholarship Award 2021