Alice Hutt

I grew up in 1970s Brixton, one chapter of my childhood in politically active squat communities - philosophies and experiences that still resonate now. In 1981, the morning after the riots, I was gifted a bulk box of sellotape; my making life began for real then, keeping me company as life shifted to intensely dysfunctional years in a tiny council flat with tiny windows in a vast council estate. Over the last year, my work has explored where (my) human sensations and the natural world touch and interact. Lived experiences; a disenfranchising society, disconnect, loss of self, traumatic and scary dissociation, distortion felt on a physical and psychological level. And the process of reclamation, rejuvenation.. and challenges that came and still come having found a quiet rebellion living alone in a woodland. The rent for a place of solitude under the trees is ongoing conservation work, tackling landslides, erosion, ash dieback - not that I had the skillset to handle these, just the cojones to try. Almost daily there are chores to collect water, chop wood, sweep the encroaching forest from my dishevelled cabin. The continued touch, sound and taste of the materials around me, are at the core of my artwork, it feels like a collaboration with nature.