Silvia Champion

My projects often involve finding a space,reading it by spending time there, opening up dialogue with the community, intervening by being present and making something publicly in the space and finally, transform the space in to a place. My presence and role as an artist are crucial throughout the project. This means being in control of process and outcome as well as design of the intervention as a whole. I want to emphasise the role of dialogue and negotiation without collapsing the relationships between artist, participants in my work and the audience into the work’s content. My work is not tied to the direct activation of the viewer or their literal participation in my work but there is an overlapping of the social and the aesthetic aspects of the project.

I am interested in the fine line between art and life; in finding a way to articulate an artistic perspective of real life situations such as building a house on a piece of land. I am listening and responding by setting up situations. I carry out my research in an open and fluid way building on the practice of artists and thinkers as diverse as Ann Hamilton, Thomas Hirschhorn, Yi-Fu Tuan, Michel de Certeau, Gaston Bachelard, Claire Bishop, Doreen Massey, and David Adjaye. This exhibition in S1 Artspace offers me an opportunity to continue building and expanding my work and inform its direction through new dialogue with new audiences.