2013 Toutalisque

This body of work explores embodiment and the female psyche through painting. Using methods such as collage and appropriation, images of women from history were used in order to ask if painting can speak of itself – if it can become tautological. This concept meant attempting to create a figure that supposes the experience of painting and the painting itself are both one and different. The often psychological and unsettling, disjointed limbs become a method to obstruct and distort the comfort viewing these ‘nudes’ has previously maintained. Through the discomfort inherent in the human body, Gleeson aims to offer the audience an experience of ‘having a body’ that may not have been explored by ‘the nude model’ previously.