"We learn who we are by blending into others. It requires bouncing between people who view the world differently."
LILY ALICE BAKER (b.1998, Newcastle, UK) completed her Foundation Diploma in Fine Art at Sussex Coast College in Hastings and her B.A. in Fine Art at Goldsmiths University in London.
In the arena of Baker’s university, the pub served as a melting pot where disparate social groups, fueled by diminished inhibitions and a shared desire to let off steam, come together in bacchanalias scenes where the possibility of violence lurks beneath the release of intoxication. Traditionally composed of locals watching football matches, the pub’s clientele evolved in recent years to include art students who fought for a seat at the bar. Watching people dance, flirt, and fight in the kinetically paced bar room, Baker noticed cultural markers of identity begin to dissolve into each other: Football shirts found company next to campy high-heeled boots, and stoics staring at TV Screens shared space with revelers jumping into each other’s arms. “Everything’s a hyperbole,” Baker says, “People blur into one organism, and everyone’s character is heightened.”
Drawing on both Abstract Expressionism and figurative painting, Baker’s work explores her own identity in a world catered to masculinity. Naturally inclined to push herself outside her boundaries, Baker navigates spaces that are not traditionally a safe haven for female or queer people and, with a keen eye for body language, renders the revealing ways in which gender is performed.
We learn who we are by blending into others. It requires bouncing between people who view the world differently.”
SELECTED EXHIBITIONS: Baker’s work has been presented in solo and group exhibitions in London, San Francisco, New York, Mexico City, and Zurich, among others.
IN THE ARTIST'S WORDS
“The overarching theme of my work is humanness, interaction, memory, nostalgia, relationships, and sex. Only recently have I realised it has always been a search…”
