Beth works intuitively and unconsciously, often on multiple pieces at once, from forged iron or clay sculptures, to collage, photography, printing and drawing. Whatever she is making, the spirit in which she works is always the same: to find and describe the strange, wild and connective elements all around us. She says “I draw on many things for inspiration – personal symbols, the collective consciousness, and the things I see, hear and feel every day.”
She has one piece at the Cotswold Sculpture Park this year: The Lady:
“The Lady is a very large embodiment of a figure I make and draw again and again. She represents many female archetypes, the Empress, the Mother, the High Priestess, the Virgin and any number of Goddesses! I made her very quickly, she seemed to rise out of nowhere. I shaped her frame out of steel bars, which I welded together, and then I clothed her in layer upon layer of tightly stretched chicken wire. As the layers built up, her covering became thicker and denser. I had the whole piece dipped at the galvanisers, which meant a trip to the biggest galvanisers in the country! This was partly to prevent rusting, but also I love the pale ghostly grey colour of the galvanised steel. She changes in different lights, sometimes she looks like stone, and other times you can see right through her like a cloud.”
