Emerging Artist Award 2021
Emblem of the Pandemic
Emblem of the Pandemic
150mm x 250mm each (five masks in total)
Copper Repoussé
Smiles & grins, fat & lying. Stay away, cover your face, it’s under control, life in lockdown, life is dying / Weeps with tears, helpless with emotion. Stay at home, wash your hands, it’s all online. Homes are made, hearts are broken / Kind and caring for community and strength. The people clap their hands for the NHS. Stay alert, socially distanced, it’s the new normal / In these unprecedented times we seldom speak. A mask for humanity, truth and peace / The death mask is you, the death mask is me, through the eyes of the mask we look and we see.
Jack Waygood
My practice is centrally shaped by first-hand experience of a subject matter.
I then make links, exploring topics such as the industrial revolution, commedia dell'arte and traveller culture; within this approach I am continuously collecting aesthetics and forms and documenting them in my sketchbook. I experiment and play around with the visual style projected in my work.
Symbolism embodies my designs and is used to provoke a sense of life and death. The imagery speaks of the struggling human condition and our impact upon the planet. I like to explore a wonderfully dark and bizarre language, like the harlequin offering intrigue and captivation but also tricks and danger.
I work with forged steel as my core process, the physicality and skill of manipulation is very important to me and I feel is made obvious in the end results. My creations have been used in collaborations and so-far have taken the form of sculpture, performance, live events and videos.
As an artist I am attempting to make my work engaging to audiences as well as being of a practical nature. I’m currently interested in street protest and environmental art and will be exploring ways to respond to this by means of adaption and mutable processes.