‘I like to think of the surface of the paper as a membrane’ – Five Minutes With Rachel Goodyear

Greg Thorpe

Artist Rachel Goodyear speaks to Greg Thorpe about snow-topped mountains and the imagined space beyond the surface of the page.

1.) What artist has most influenced your practice and why?

A long-term influence has always been Louise Bourgeois. I turn to her works often, in particular her raw and intimate drawings on paper, and always admired her ability to capture a sense of being human through whichever medium and scale she chose. Another artist who has been an inspiration, especially over recent years, is Dorothea Tanning (and female surrealist artists in particular). During lockdown, her works of bodily forms pushing out from beneath the wallpaper and morphing out of the furniture have been more poignant to me than ever.

2.) What is your relationship to paper as a creative material? What draws you to it?

I was originally drawn to paper for its immediacy and intimacy – an instant connection between the mind, pencil and page of a sketchbook. Yet paper can also offer a world in itself; a place to lose yourself for long periods of time. My overall practice has underlying themes exploring the conscious and subconscious and I often like to think of the surface of the paper as a membrane between the world I occupy and the imagined space beyond the surface. I enjoy playing with this sense of space and that boundary by occasionally allowing my drawings to slip off the walls as forms cut out from their paper background that are free-standing in space, or by combining hand-drawn animations projected onto works on paper.

3.) Have you been making any art during Lockdown? If so, can you tell us a bit about what you're working on?

It has been at a different pace and scale during lockdown, in a small area of my home, but I feel fortunate I have been able to continue drawing through these times. A lot of themes and motifs that have been emerging include holes in walls, female figures in quiet contemplation and between worlds, and tiny dried plants and fungi – I have been making many studies of these, looking at them close-up and exploring textures and their elegant, almost bodily, shapes. They are now taking on a new presence and I’m looking forward to seeing where they will take me next.

 4.) What are you reading/watching/listening to atm?

 I have just finished reading The Kin of Ata Are Waiting For You by Dorothy Bryant and I’m still in that surreal in-between state where part of me is coming back to the real-world and a bit of me is still in the story. My mind’s still pondering over the imagery, the notions of utopias, human nature displaying beauty and violence, and spiritual journeys through dreams and storytelling. 

5.) If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you choose?

I would love to look out at a snow-capped mountain-scape with a blanket of dense forests. There have been a couple of occasions that I have been lucky to see such a view and that feeling of the sublime stays forever. I live in a high-rise and during lockdown I have often looked over the roof-tops and the city and dreamed of mountains in the distance. 

Rachel Goodyear is a Lancashire-born multi-disciplinary artist, educated in Fine Art at Leeds Metropolitan University. She is one of the longest-serving tenants of Islington Mill, the independent artist community in Salford, and is now one of its co-directors, supporting the growth and development of the organisation. Rachel has exhibited internationally and in 2017 had a solo show at The New Art Gallery Walsall, with an accompanying publication, CATCHING SIGHT. Rachel is represented by Pippy Houldsworth Gallery, London. Visit her website www.rachelgoodyear.com and Instagram @rachel_goodyear.