Sonia Stanyard

London based artist Sonia Stanyard is a multi disciplinary artist whose recent collections are a series of large scale abstract paintings. She also works with paper, creating process led abstract compositions using a single colour. 

Stanyard states that 'Materials and processes are my starting point. I am drawn to making work that is labor intensive and requires a huge investment of time. I feel a connection to pre-industrial crafts such as lace making, drystone walling and weaving. Practices that require an affinity and knowledge of a material, often rely on body movement and are highly repetitive. 

The concepts of reduction, repetition and setting boundaries are ideas that run through my painted work also.

My paintings stretch an idea and exaggerate an action over and over.

I often repeat and layer a painted line or poured blob to a point where the individual part is no longer evident and I am left with an image that could be a murmuration or a macro detail of a flower.

With Stanyard's works on paper, part of an ongoing series, she has used hand printed silk screened paper to form the basis for all subsequent works. 

Setting limits with material and colour help her discover different ways to work with her chosen material, 

The outcomes have ranged from explosively ripping larges sheets to patiently reordering the chaotic scraps of debris on the studio floor into controlled delicate lines.

Sonia states: 'My aim is to express its possibilities. Both endeavours seem to presently preoccupied with an initial restriction which then gives way to a sense of freedom'.