latex, glue, food colouring, inks, nail varnish, bedsheets, dust, dirt, sand, t-shirts, glitter

This collaborative work was developed through a series of workshops with OSE’s Despacito Art School and members of the creative, teachers, and educators network programme, Lacuna. Led by artist Samara Scott, the project involved sharing their practice’s approaches and methods to create sessions focused on making and experimenting.

Samara collaborated with the groups to explore experimental mark-making and image transfer, focusing on the medium of latex. The process involved staining, casting patinas, bruising, and building layers with experimental image transfers, sharing live learnings and failures. Participants worked with their hands and fingers, layering over each other’s work, embracing both mess and delicacy, luminosity and liquidity, making skins and hides, superimpositions and cleavings, forensic liftings, and images. The DIY processes included ‘hijacking’ found textiles such as bedsheets and old t-shirts.

For the final work, Samara created a series of sculptural textile pieces, weaving together the creations from these sessions along with both collective and individual contributions. The work is stretched around the fabric of the building, continuing to play with its fluidity

Credits:

Despacito Artists:
Knight Hall; Kingsley Taylor-Smith; Raiden Taylor-Smith; Odin Taylor-Smith; Christly Chiyama; Daisy Chiyama; Minnie Clays; Maria Balazova; Benitta Balazova; Magdalena Gabarova; Eddie Cesar; Milka Gaborova

With support from facilitator: 
Vlasta Hozova

Lacuna network participants:
Polly Brannan; Alice Davies; Wilhemina Healy; Yasmin Perez; Kat Cutler-MacKenzie; Sara Trillo; Julie Caves; Cyd Parkerl Mel McLaren

Thank you to OSE Associates: Lucia Coppola, Jas Dhillon and Emelia Kerr Beale for supporting these sessions.

Despacito Art School is a project based arts programme inviting guest artists to develop new work, techniques and explore contemporary art practices with a group of young people and their families. Despacito is open to young people aged 5 to 12, who live in and around Cliftonville and Margate. The art school was named by the young artists after their favourite 2017 summer hit. Despacito provides regular opportunities to showcase the work of the young artists to their families, the local community and the broader public; these include exhibitions in and around our building, projects in collaboration with our community partners, and participation in events and festivals.

Lacuna is a creative network aimed at teachers & educators across the region to share and develop their knowledge and approach to creative learning; underpinned by creativity, curiosity and critical thinking and making use of the cultural context of Thanet.

Lacuna is a collaboration between Arts Education Exchange, Open School East & Turner Contemporary ~

Samara Scott expansive practice is rooted in a deep research and inquiry into the malleability and mutative nature of materials belonging to contemporary production and waste. In liquid mingling assemblages/ tapestries of stockings, sunscreen, foam, broken glass, oils, eyeshadow, goo and gunk, there is ambience of a viscous and sensuous post-capital landscape. An enquiry into depths of a volatile system of things, of objects, commodities and conditions. 

Samara Scott has exhibited widely and internationally. Select exhibitions include: Discordia, KM21, The Hague, Netherlands 2023; Soft Water Hard Stone, New Museum Triennial, New York, USA (2021); Mixing it Up: Painting Today, Hayward Gallery, London, UK (2021); The Doldrums, CAPC Museum, Bordeaux, France 2020; Days are Dogs, Palais De Tokyo, Paris.