The Art History & Visual Cultures Research Centre invites you to a research seminar with
Isabel Seligman, Curator at The British Museum
‘A wordless, thoughtless vacuum’: Ithell Colquhoun’s drawing practice
Thursday 8th February 2018 at 5pm in Keynes Seminar Room 13, University of Kent
Using the examination of three drawings in the British Museum’s collection as a starting point (Three Growing Forms, 1941, Mausoleum, c. 1944 and Rock Pool, 1947), this talk will investigate the role of drawing within Ithell Colquhoun’s wider artistic practice. What were the numerous automatist techniques used by Colquhoun, and what was their interaction? What relation do they have to broader currents of thought concerning surrealist drawing and artistic process? Examining her practice across different media, including the relationship between text and image in her works concerning place, such as The Living Stones (1957), this paper aims to gain a fuller understanding of Colquhoun’s innovative and interdisciplinary oeuvre.