The Clumped Spirit

Jean Barth trained as an oil painter, and her works play on traditional genres of portraiture and still life but exceed them. Using 3D modelling software, she creates stages, props, and avatars, which are then transmuted into screen-printed oil paintings and animated videos. In her paintings, screen-printed images are brushed to soften them, combining the virtual and the painterly. Much of Barth's work explores themes of self-representation and embodiment, contending with her experience as a trans-woman navigating pressures of visibility and vulnerability. Her works often depict domestic scenes with idealised imagery or bodies overwhelmed by decay. Mounds of organic material such as fruit peel and leftover food are left to decompose in her uncanny world, imbued with ennui and listlessness. 'The Clumped Spirit' makes a dramatic move into sculpture, featuring 3D-printed works coated in zinc that recall petrified figures from Pompeii.