Cardfiff based artist Tess Gray presents a new body of work ‘making visible, hidden stories’, looking at female neurodiverse experience and overlaps between identity, mental health and gender. Landscape remains an influence in this work but takes on a more theatrical role to illuminate the narrative of the characters that inhabit them. Chaos and rigid practices live together harmoniously with stillness while misconceptions, expectations and assumptions come up against obscured perspectives.
These abstracted observations may appear nonsensical, as though there is a puzzle to be completed, but they are only stories and stories that mystify don’t necessarily need to be solved to be understood.
Tess Gray graduated from Winchester School of Art in 2012 and is now based at Kings Road Studios, Cardiff. She was Artist in residence with Aamir Art House, Goa in 2018. Following this her painting Bacterium Stroll made during the residency was selected as a finalist in the 2019 Jacksons painting prize.
In 2020 the painting Bacteria Gathered at Avebury was shortlisted for the Beep Painting Biennale at elysium gallery and was voted by the visitors to the exhibition as the people’s prize winner.
This work was funded by the Arts Council of Wales.