CuratorSpace Artist Bursary #25: Matilda Moors

Matilda Moors an artist and academic working with sculpture, writing, print and installation. She deploys languages associated with youth culture to create pieces with a skewed-cartoonesque-cuteness. Her practice and research focus on the tension between cuteness and violence as a way to probe the contradictions in contemporary consumer culture.

"My project is the proposal and development of a new outdoor sculptural work for ‘a space’ arts in Southampton as part of their programme celebrating the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth. This bursary will support a pattern cutting course to underpin my current knowledge of fabric construction with deeper technical understanding so I can translate my proposal designs into ambitious and complex pieces. 

For this project, I will develop an original character that merges Austen's models of girlhood with 'cute gothic' elements found in characters like Sanrio’s Kuromi and Bartok from Don Bluth’s Anastasia, as a way of connecting Jane Austen's Southampton heritage to contemporary visual culture. This work offers a new interpretation of Austen's exploration of 'girlish imagination' visible in how her characters conflate fiction with reality.

This conflation features frequently in my work, through a longing for the fictional cartoon world to manifest within our messy-flesh-world. Proposed as a large, ripstop fabric sculpture in the style of my Sans Sinew series, the work brings the 'girl goth' aesthetic to life, and furthers my exploration of the 'abject cute'. The project is planned for Autumn 2025 as part of Southampton's broader celebrations of Austen's anniversary."

You can see more of Matilda's work at https://www.curatorspace.com/artists/matildamoors.

Find out more about the CuratorSpace Artist Bursary and how to apply at https://www.bursary.curatorspace.com.

 

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