Brittany Shepherd: Coward

In Coward, Shepherd presents a new collection of oil paintings, rendered in her distinctive photo-realist style with vibrant pops of colour. Objects and compositions taken from her library of internet research often consider warp or document snapshots of fetish and niche esoteric practices, which Shepherd isolates to make both alluring and uncanny. Themes of masking and hiding mimic the role of the artist here in an interplay of exposure and vulnerability, further underpinned by the presence of a semi-autobiographical text written by Shepherd for the exhibition. The distinct visual and haptic quality of the works spans latex, metal, underwear and PVC, represented as binding and wrapping of the body or face. The collection points to the erotic gaze, entering into a semiotic dance of signals and signifiers for fantasy and desire, offering and withholding at the same time.

Latex is a natural substance. A liquid defence system present in over 20,000 species, deterring feeders with a sticky, bitter, toxic resistance. Coveted for its protective properties, latex is harvested at scale from rubber trees as milky white tears. Pierced, stabbed, drained and repurposed to prevent piercing, stabbing and draining. Her cheap imitators – nitrile, silicone and butyl – are synthetic materials ironically produced by the same substance uniquely capable of destroying her: fossil fuels. Douse a piece of natural rubber in petroleum-based mineral solvents and you will watch her swell, crack and tear. Do it while wearing nitrile gloves if you want to add insult to injury.

In the studio, odourless, invisible fumes evaporate in the air, permeating my lungs. A wash of Izosol-diluted oils forms the underpainting of a rubber mask. Smears of lead, cobalt and cadmium are everywhere. The studio of my live/work space slowly infiltrates the domestic half, blurring church and state. I remove a nitrile glove to find a glob of lead paint sinking into my wrist, encased by the synthetic skin like a sauna. There is no such thing as caution under the trance of flow state. It’s a condition of possession where one awakens to find the body contorted in strange painful positions. The circulation has been cut off to my foot as though tied with an invisible latex tourniquet, but the relief is palpable.

Paint is a revealing medium; one can’t help but ‘show their hand’. London’s National Gallery conducts X-rays of old-master oil paintings, exposing layers of revision and dissecting the artist’s process. It’s a humiliation ritual. Courbet’s self-portrait The Wounded Man conceals the embrace of a lover, replacing her with a bleeding heart. One of Miró’s most famous abstractions, Pintura, was painted on top of a traditional portrait of his mother. For the artist, privacy does not exist. Conscious gestures only serve as cover for unconscious drives which cannot be understood or examined until acted out. It’s the necessary sacrifice.

Obsession is like gasoline. The fetishist and the artist have much in common: material fixations, absurd gestures and rituals driven by a force beyond control. The lack of practical social utility in these expressions is what unites them. It’s against the biological imperative. My artist friends and I agree, the libido vanishes under the condition of serious production. The studio is a nunnery. We are in service of something greater than ourselves. Transforming the low into something powerful, or ‘base materialism’ as Georges Bataille calls it, like a soiled rubber sheet for sale on eBay for more than a new one, or a painting based on an image of that sheet for even more. There are limits to rationality, after all.

The algorithm is a voyeur and everyone is a cop. A virtual security force working overtime. Desire in all its forms is policed. Your post has been flagged. Your account has been deleted. I’m messaging someone with an invisibility fetish on Instagram. Their account presents meticulously photoshopped images of invisible women who appear as silhouettes of levitating outfits engaged in various activities, teaching a class, performing a dance, playing tennis, drinking a coffee with an invisible girlfriend. The account is messaging me in character as an invisible woman. I ask her if I can also be invisible. An hour later she sends me an image of my hollowed-out dress floating in my studio on my birthday, like a phantom with a wine glass hovering in front. It satisfies something deep inside me; she is safe.