Born in 1989, Lives and works in London.

Emma Witter is a British artist who works with found and discarded biomass to make intricate, botanical sculptures, breathing new life into lost things.

Education:
2012
1st Class Hons. Performance Design and Practice
Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design

Final major project ‘Feast’ – a devised, immersive performance, was highlighted for ‘Risk & Innovation’ and documentation requested for the CSM archives.

2008
Foundation Diploma: Art and Design
London College of Fashion

Awards / Grants:
WTLF Mag X Omved Gardens – ‘Death’ Photo Competition Jan 20 : Shortlisted
Eccentric Artist of the Year – The Eccentric Club Awards 2015 : Winner
Bloom Award – Warsteiner 2014 : Shortlisted
New Business Award – UAL Enterprise Awards 2014 : Winner
Princes Trust Enterprise Programme Start up Fund – 2014: Recipient
UAL Seed Fund – 2014: Winner
Personal /NonPublished Award – Creative Review Photo Annual 2014 : Winner
Hix Award – Hix Art Gallery 2014 : Shortlisted

Residencies:
Artist in Residence – Selfridges & Picton Studios: April – Oct 21
Artist in Residence – Xenia Creative Retreat, Hampshire: Jan – Feb 21
Artist in Residence – The Sarabande Foundation Mayfair Takeover at House of Bandits: Oct 20
Studio Resident – Sarabande Foundation: Oct 18 – Oct19
Artist in Residence – Mark Hix’s Tramshed Restaurant : Jan 18 – March 18


Selected Exhibitions:
Solo Shows:
‘Remember You Must Die’: Solo Show – Sarabande Foundation : Sept 19
‘BLOOM’: Solo Show – Hix Art Gallery: March 18

Group Shows:
Collaborations Show – Gallery Fumi: Sept 21
Triggered Economics – 34 Bruton st: May – June 21
Crafting a Difference – SoShiro Gallery: Jan – March 21
House of Bandits – Sarabande Foundation at Burberry: Oct – Dec 20
Blanc De Chine Contemporary – Ting Ying Studio at The Scottish Gallery: Oct 20
It’s Good To Be Home – Gallery Fumi : Sept – Dec 20
Of Time and Place – @livingobject Virtual Exhibition : Oct 20
Vegetate – @the_vegetate_project : April 20
Repeat – Rear Window London : Dec 19
Florid – Rear Window London : Nov 19
Artists for Blue –  Blue Marine Foundation : Nov 19
Chroma – 127 Sloane St : Oct 19
Art in the City – Worshipful Company of Painter Stainers : Oct 19
Stable – Sarabande Group Show : August 19
ING Discerning Eye – Mall Galleries : Nov 17
The London Group Open – Cello Factory : Nov 17
The London Group Open – Cello Factory : Oct 15
Summer Salon – Candid Arts Trust : Aug 15
Hix Award Group Show – Hix Art Gallery : Sept 14

Fairs:
Eye of the Collector – Two Temple Place : September 21
Platform at London Art Fair – Ting Ying Studio: Jan 21
Focus 20 – Ting Ying Studio – Design Centre Chelsea Harbour : Sept 20
Collect –Ting Ying Studio – Somerset House : Feb/March 20
Lapada Art & Antiques Fair : Sept 19
The Other Art Fair 10th Edition – Truman Brewery : Oct 15

Talks:
Material Matters
Podcast with Grant Gibson : Sept 21

Collect Selects No 2.
Textiles and New Materials, in association with the V&A and RCA : Feb 21

London Art Fair Edit
Panel discussion with Grant Gibson : Jan 21

Living Object Gallery Tag Talks for ‘Of Time and Place’ Exhibition
Interviewing Romilly Saumarez-Smith : Oct 21

Collect Booth Talk with Ting Ying Gallery
‘Using Waste Bones From Food and Catering Industries’ : Feb 20

Central Saint Martins
Enterprise and Opportunities Sessions – Special Lecturer: Jan 17

Central Saint Martins
Diversity Matters Week – Special Lecturer : April 16

Affiliations:
Michelangelo Foundation – Homo Faber Guide For Contemporary Master Craftsmanship
Freeman of The City of London
Freeman of The Worshipful Company of Painter – Stainers

Curatorial Statement

“White bone found on the grazing: the rough, porous language of touch
and its yellowing, ribbed impression in the grass….”

Seamus Heaney, extract from his poem Bone Dreams (1939 – 2013)

 Artists and craftsmen have always been fascinated by bone, their work often exploring the dichotomy of nature and artifice: it is an investigation of life and being. There is more than enough evidence from our ancestors who carved swimming reindeers onto antlers, fashioned weapons and tools such as spear throwers,  knives, awls, fish hooks and needles as well as creating decorated flutes, whistles, toys and pendants. However, contemporary society mainly associates bones with suffering, demise and as a gloomy substance,  rather than as a tool of expression and voyaging. 

Yet again, artists, crafts people and scientists take a different stance working with this calcified material, making ink for body tattoos from ground animal bone, as well as soaps, candy, ceramics, oils and photographic processes. 

The British artist Emma Witter utilises intricate bone structures to create fragile, flower-patterned forms. To her, this organic material conveys beauty and spirituality rather than mortality. These opposing facets inspire Witter to bring to the surface the relics of domestic animals. She acts as a bone collector who salvages her medium from restaurants, butchers and her own cooking waste along with combing the river Thames. 

Interested in the history of this hard, whitish skeletal tissue and its past use, Witter states:  ‘the material reveals much more and dictates the works’. She does not sketch her ideas onto paper, she works with her hands, engaging in small three-dimensional experiments, testing how the individual segments assemble and embrace each other. Her method is visceral, envisaging her finished effigies.
Her opaque miniature blossoms are made of countless carefully selected bone fragments orchestrated into delicate floral arrangement. They are attached onto small stands, displayed in glass vessels or directly on the wall to appear like beautiful, surreal botanical models and modern-day memento mori.

The cleaning process is painstakingly slow. It involves boiling and scrubbing the bones clean before they submerged in bleach and dried. Larger and more greasier specimens are placed in salt for several days in the attempt to extract any last oils, to achieve a dry texture and a clean white colour. Witter organises her findings systematically into size and their anatomical shape, akin to a tool kit. She uses different instruments and glues to construct her intricate pieces before she carefully applies a layer of painters’ gel medium on their surface which acts as a sealant to prevent the glue and bones becoming brittle.     

Witter, who grew up in Hertfordshire, was immensely inspired by Henry Moore’s bone derived sculptures and visited Moore’s maquette studio regularly. She has also been influenced by Eileen Agar’s approach to nature and transformation through found objects and unorthodox juxtaposition that challenge  our macabre relationship with bone.

Emma Witter is a London based artist. In 2008, she earned her diploma in Art and Design from The London College of Fashion. In 2012, she received a first-class honours degree in Performance Design and Practice from Central Saint Martins. On graduating, Witter won the ‘Seed Fund’ Award’ from the University of the Arts London – a grant to set up her own studio practice. At the same time, she was awarded a start-up grant from The Princes Trust Enterprise Programme. After a year of studio practice, she was nominated for the ‘Best New Business Award’ during UAL Enterprise Week 2014,  and won. Other awards include ‘Eccentric Artist of the Year’ 2015, from The Eccentric Club – and the category of ‘Personal/Non published’ in the Creative Review Photo Annual 2015. She was selected at the Worth Global Style Network talent section as ‘One to Watch’. Her work has been featured in publications such as The Gourmand, Vice Munchies, Mosaic Science and many more.

Witter has participated in numerous exhibitions, most notably her solo show ‘Bloom’ at Hix Art 2018, an exhibition resulting from her three-month residency at Hix’s Tramshed restaurant. She was selected twice for the ING Discerning Eye show at The Mall Galleries 2017, and The London Group Open at The Cello Factory, in 2015 and 2017.Currently, she is a studio resident at Sarabande, the Lee Alexander McQueen Foundation, in London.

©Renée Pfister 2019

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