Kyle Kirkpatrick

Layer, Shift, Lift

3rd March - 14th April 2013 

‘Not long ago I visited the limestone and chalk cliffs on the North Norfolk coast. As I was walking below them I remember constantly looking up to the top of the cliffs, overwhelmed and cautious of the overbearing layers of rock that towered above, dwarfing me…  As I continued walking I found myself picking up small fragments of rock that had broken from the cliff face: small fragments that I could hold in my hands from which I could get a realistic sense of scale, form and materiality. 

Whilst drawn to natural landscape formations I am both overwhelmed and cautious in their presence. I find myself shrinking, hesitant to interact fully. The process of mud coating my hands or sand filling the gaps between my fingers for me is a stressful one. When I do feel the compulsion to pick up and touch this is instantly followed by the need to cleanse. As a remedy I create sterile and ordered spaces in which I interpret and reinterpret the natural landscape, condensing and reimagining forms and structures to create imagined landscapes…  Responding to forms and growths found in the natural world I construct objects, replicate forms and combine imagery allowing me to work through my thoughts’.

Kyle Kirkpatrick is an artist based in Bedfordshire and Peckham, London. He graduated in 2010 with a BA (hons) in Fine Art at Norwich University College of the Arts specialising in Printmaking and Photomedia. He recently completed an MSc in Applied Technologies: Rapid Prototyping and Digital Technologies at Ravensbourne, North Greenwich. Recent group exhibitions include: Think Print at The Nancy Victor Gallery and Constructing the Ideal at Stew Gallery, Norwich, which he both curated and exhibited in. He recently completed a Young Artist in Residence programme at Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridgeshire.