Welcome to my website. As a visual artist, my work has recently been in the area of installation and performance, though I do not define my practice by the mediums I employ. I have experimented widely with video and still photography, drawing, painting and sculptural constructions, many of these being employed in my installation and performance pieces.

My approach is that the medium is not the focus of the work; rather it is there to facilitate my need to communicate, the focus therefore being what is communicated. Much of my earlier experimentation with oil painting, with digital photography, and with wax as a sculptural material amounted to the development of a language; with these mediums in particular I learned to play with materials. This allowed my manipulation of them to take its own direction as a dialogue developed between myself and the unplanned results of this play - an intuitive approach working on a different level to a cerebral or methodological one, and an approach which I have found encourages my work to flow naturally. Having developed confidence in this approach to materials, I realised that I could introduce my concerns into this creative stream without disrupting its natural flow.

Recent works have been characterised by a close scrutiny of my own personal and emotional concerns; my choice to use my own vulnerabilities and fears as subject matter arises in part from my admiration of the artist Joseph Beuys, and his entreaty to “show your wounds”; Beuys believed that only by exposing our wounds could they have the chance to heal. My own belief is that hiding our fears gives them greater potency. My hope is that, if I can make an honest exposition of my vulnerabilities, then I may achieve healing in the process; and that others may identify with my revelation, and perhaps this might help them in their own healing process.

My latest work is the installation and performance piece Walking, Drawing, Virus, The Allopathic Paradigm And The Organismic Valuing Process (2008), and was constructed and performed as my final show for my BA (Hons) in Visual Art in June 2008; Contact Boundary (2007) was shown at Greenroom, Manchester, in October 2008, following its successful showing at Dean Clough Galleries, Halifax in late 2007. Pages for both these pieces can be found via the links above, or via the Installation page.

There are also pages documenting my painting and photography. I hope to add more pages soon; in the meantime I hope you will enjoy visiting this site. I would welcome any comments or feedback, which can be given via the contact me page.

David Featherston