Lucy Ellerton

Working across sculpture and printmaking, Lucy Ellerton (b.1993) makes portraits of the people and places she knows intimately. Through labour-intensive processes, Ellerton creates objects evocative of her subjects. Disposable things familiar to us but used without consideration; toilet roll, bin liners. In diligently recreating mass-produced objects, Ellerton transforms throw-away objects into souvenirs representative of our contemporary culture; exploring the emotional associations we develop with ordinary things and asking how we assign meaning.

Ideas of play permeate throughout Ellerton's practice. Her work conjures feelings of childhood play: arranging doll's furniture, occupying imaginary worlds. This act of 'make believe' is embedded in the work. Ellerton constructs a tangible world, somewhere familiar but where the slightest awry detail betrays the fictitious nature of her built universe. These alterations feel uncanny; Ellerton's work is so close to reality yet recognises its falseness. Her sculptures function as memorials of objects that have touched people's lives, ni an ordinary and insignificant way. However, the understanding that she cannot wholly recreate that which is gone, evidenced in the disposability of her chosen objects and the weighty awareness of lost time, impacts and transforms the viewer's relationship with the sculptures. The result is a cohesive body of work that provides an intimate insight into Ellerton's relationships, and resonates beyond the direct relationship of the artist and her subject.

Lucy Ellerton studied at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (BFA, 2015) and The RCA (MA, 2023). She lives and works in London.