GILL BUTTON
Faces, particularly, women’s faces, inspire Gill Button. Snapshots of “new” visages found online, decayed Victorian photographs of long forgotten sitters discovered at flea markets, glorious icons of the silver screen, family photo albums… They all inspire her melancholic and emotive portraiture.
Oil and ink are Button’s media of choice; she relishes the organic life and independent will inherent to these materials. The interactive relationship she shares with paint and colours enables the bold, fluid brushwork that grants life to the faces she captures and also provides a dreamlike parallel realm for beholders to escape into.
Button’s traditional western academic art education has not only honed her techniques, but also trained her observation and ability to engage. She empathises with each of the “strangers” she paints, and as she draws out their emotions, echoes of the artist herself are also revealed.
“At once confrontational and cool, intimate and vulnerable,” Larissa Pham’s description for Gucci points to the essence in Button’s art: an unintentional response to the contradictory aspects of us all, the conflicts of confidence and insecurities.
脸，特别是女性的脸，是Gill Button创作中最强的启发。网上发现的时尚新宠、跳蚤集市淘到维多利亚时代老照片、银幕上的明星、家传的相册……都是她充满情感又带点悲愁的肖像之原型。
Gill Button主要用油彩与水墨作画，她特别钟情于这两种材料自身的生命力与自主性。从她豪爽流畅的笔触，可见艺术家与颜料、颜色的互动，而这关系赋予她笔下脸庞灵气与活力，同时将观众引入一个梦幻的平行世界。
受传统西方学院派艺术教育熏陶的Gill Button，锻炼出纯熟绘画技巧，以及细微的观察力与代入能力。从她的作品可见她与所绘的“陌生人”有着深厚的情感连结，画中掩映着艺术家自己的影子。
“看似充满对抗性，但又很酷，内里却有点脆弱，同时又有种亲密感”，Larissa Pham为Gucci写的描述点出Gill Button创作的精髓：有意无意地回应着我们每人心里在自信与犹豫之间的徘徊，每天面对着的内在矛盾 。
