My recent processes have involved the photographic: a mix of photographic techniques with hand made marks and drawings. I have incorporated drawn marks into the photographic surface, as well as making my own ‘handmade’ negatives, from which I have printed. I have worked in both colour and black and white and used a great deal of traditional and alternative processes such as pinhole photography, cyanotype and salt printing.
Much of my current work has taken the form of site specific installation and the creation of objects for installation, including a recent project which involved the creation of 500 handmade objects based on tourist trinkets, incorporating individual drawings and text as well as a photographic installation involving every single print I have ever made hung in bags on washing lines.
My work deals with themes of identity and character, working with both the notions of personal identity and cultural identity. I am particularly interested in Scottish cultural identity and the influences upon it, often using traditional genres of portraiture and landscape to address these issues.
Currently my interest in these ideas has been dealt with through the broad use of humour in my work – largely using pastiche and parody. Humour in art is something that interests me greatly and my current practice seeks to develop a deeper understanding of this way of working.
Humour functions on a multitude of levels. We can be entertained by it, amused by it, charmed and pleased. Similarly we can be shocked by it, instructed by it, educated and horrified. Humour does not solely exist to amuse and lighten our mood. It can be manipulated, frequently more effectively than a more ‘serious’ approach, to make very powerful points, affecting the viewer far deeper than a more formidable approach would have done.
Humour is very critical. It can cut to the quick extremely successfully, whilst at the same time masquerading as ‘only a joke’. Perhaps in the critical society that we live in, immersed in the competitive nature of life, humour may be the only way to get through, simply because of its cruel tendencies. With this argument in mind, my practice seeks to develop a body of work using humour which avoids the use of one-liners and instead examines the psychological underpinning of humour.
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Norma-Louise Thallon was born in Glasgow, Scotland in 1978. She graduated from Glasgow School of Art in 2000 with a First Class Honours degree in Fine Art and then in 2002 with a Master of Philosophy in Art and Design. Norma-Louise is currently a research student at the Royal College of Art in London where she is working on her PhD by practice.
Norma has received a great deal of support for her work from a range of sources, including commissions and awards. She recently received the Angus Art Purchase Award and her work has been shown lately in solo shows at The Red Gallery, Hull and Total Kunst Gallery, Edinburgh as well as recent joint shows at the Stephen Lawrence Gallery, London and Streetlevel Gallery, Glasgow.
Norma has completed several residencies, including the PVA Media Lab at Peterborough Digital Arts, Peterborough and the RSW Residency at Hospitalfield House, Arbroath. Norma has also published a great deal recently, including an article in Engage Journal and a feature in Studies in Photography, the annual publication from the Scottish Society for the History of Photography. In addition, her work has been supported by a number of organizations, including Glasgow City Council, the Hope Scott Trust and the Cross Trust. Norma has also recently had a significant number of her photographs purchased on behalf of Great Ormond Street Hospital, where her work is being permanently exhibited.
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