“These [works] are the things I have inside that I toss out because there are burdens with which you cannot live or drag along…” - Belkis Ayón
Natalie Charles (she/her) is a multidisciplinary artist from London whose work explores connections between people and the impact of our personal histories. She honours her sensitivity to materials and flexible approach as a ‘toolkit’, working across a range of media, including drawing, painting, printmaking and animation. The foundations of her practice are materiality, shadows and texture. She makes some of her materials, enabling her to connect with and understand their potential. Her work then draws the viewer in by highlighting the intimacy in quieter moments, often through cleverly cropped compositions and delicate attention to shadows. Scale and rigour are imperative to her process, as is maintaining a playful approach to texture, pushing the surface and medium to evoke an emotional response in the viewer.
Natalie has of late been investigating her ancestry, personally and through her practice. The Things I Have Inside, a new body of work taking its name from a quote by Cuban printmaker Belkis Ayón that deeply resonated with her early on in her journey into generational healing, is an articulation of the innate spiritual guidance that steers and protects her in life.
Natalie is currently on the Drawing Year 2023/4 at the Royal Drawing School having graduated with a BA Hons in Illustration from the University for the Creative Arts in 2013. She worked as an animator before pivoting to Operations and Communications management for arts charities. Natalie is a Trustee at Packed Lunch Productions and Content Manager for Middleground Magazine.
A free exhibition, with proceeds from all sales going to the artist’s growth and funding public programmes in advancing and diversifying engagement in visual storytelling.
