Interview Directory 

ART

Name: Susan Aldworth, artist

"I had always been fascinated by big questions about what makes us human: like ‘what is the self’ and ‘what is consciousness’?“

Susan, you look back on a career spanning over 40 years, during which you have investigated the relationship between the physical brain and our sense of identity. When did you find your way to this artistic focus? 

I studied philosophy at university before I studied printmaking. I had always been fascinated by big questions about what makes us human: like ‘what is the self’ and ‘what is consciousness’? But I couldn’t see how to visualise these ideas at the start of my career and instead focussed on making work about being a mother and an artist as that was what I was grappling with in my late 20s and early 30s. But something happened which was to prove seminal. I collapsed with a suspected brain haemorrhage in 1999 and found myself on an operating table watching a scan of my brain in real time on a monitor. I was literally watching myself think. This experience connected me back to my interest in philosophy. I contacted the doctor who had performed these scans, and he agreed to let me draw in his brain scanning sessions (with patient permission) every Tuesday. These drawings were sort of portraits – they were anatomical representations of a consciousness at work. They were visual equivalents of the self. After much experimentation, I translated these drawings, through the process of etching, into prints, finding a way of working with white lines to suggest what is under the surface – visualising interiority. I called these works Brainscapes, and this body of work was exhibited as Scribing the Soul. I like to work really fast, so that the etchings have an energy - looking like they have just landed on the paper and might move off at any moment. After this, I have continued to experiment in print which I find to be a very generous and exciting medium to explore philosophical ideas of the relationship between the physical brain and the self. 

"Textiles offered the opportunity to embellish them with her story through embroidery and sewing –

 historically female skills."

In your installation, 35 antique garments belonging to your grandmother are suspended in mid-air. Why did you decide to tell the story of a journey of migration through textiles? 

After my grandmother, Luigia Berni, died, my mother gave me the nightdress that Luigia had brought with her when she moved from Italy to London in 1924. It sat in my chest of drawers for twenty years but I was always aware of it. Her story of migration was very present in my mind as it was a story of difficulty, courage and hardship. When I decided that I HAD to make some work to challenge current anti-immigration narratives in the UK, I knew that the nightdress would have to be central to the work. I thought of her difficult journey, travelling alone across Europe with a six-month old baby. I decided that the installation would show the imagined contents of her suitcase. I found a box of antique baby clothes in a junk shop, and used them together with the nightdress to unpack her story. Textiles offered the opportunity to embellish them with her story through embroidery and sewing – historically female skills.

6. Belongings 6, installation by Susan Aldworth, 2023. Photograph by Peter Abrahams

BELONGINGS 5 Susan Aldworth EXILE- sono oriunda installation shot

3 Gold_Modern-Alchemy_9, Susan Aldworth, etching, aquatint and monotype with gold leaf, 31 x 24.5 cms, 2023 

„The embroidery was brilliant – the clothes embody the story. They are poignant and beautiful.“

You painstakingly hand-embroidered these pieces with family photographs and recipes. While the news about migration in England is often very loud and harsh, this quiet, slow work acts as a counter-narrative. Was it your intention to defend the dignity of the individual against the anonymous headlines? 

Before I answer this question, I must explain the collaborative nature of Belongings. I stitched the embroidery on my grandmother’s nightdress. But I also worked with 34 embroiderers on the installation – 25 students from the Royal School of Needlework and 9 from Sleaford Embroiderers. I provided each embroiderer with an item of clothing, the embroidery threads, the text they had to sew on it and historic family photographs printed on fabric. After initial discussions about the aim of the installation and the colour choices I had made, each embroiderer had artistic freedom to stitch the story and the photograph in an imaginative way into the fabric. The embroidery was brilliant – the clothes embody the story. They are poignant and beautiful.

My intention with Belongings was to tell quietly one person’s story through this slow work in the hope it will resonate with many. I talked at length with my 96 year old great Aunt Alda who told me the story of her upbringing, and gave me the historic family photographs to work with. I was lucky to hear her first-hand narrative of growing up in the 1930 and 40s in an immigrant Italian family. The story made me feel very unsettled by current anti-immigration narratives, and I wanted to present this story of one person’s life to evoke empathy and understanding as an antidote to anonymous headlines. 

„My grandfather was imprisoned as an alien enemy during the Second World War like many Italian migrants in June1940.“

Your grandmother came to England 102 years ago. You say it took three generations before your family truly felt they "belonged." 

I am a third-generation migrant. I was the first person in my extended family to go to university, and through my mother’s marriage, I have an English surname. I BELONG. But my grandmother always told me that she had never been inside an English person’s house in the 70 years she lived in the UK. She never felt she belonged. My grandfather was imprisoned as an alien enemy during the Second World War like many Italian migrants in June1940. My grandmother had to manage a family of four children during his imprisonment with no state support, just the very small amount of money she made from cleaning jobs. She really survived on the kindness of local shopkeepers. My mother and her siblings told stories of growing up in real poverty, of having to help run the family whilst their parents worked all hours they could. My mother suffered English snobbery from her parents- in -law and at the school gate when we were small. I was brought up NOT speaking Italian although the heritage is very dear to me. I was brought up to be English. This historic story resonates with many migrants from different backgrounds a hundred years on. We all need to feel we BELONG.

„From ancient times, peoples have moved from country to country to survive or for a better life. And with global political and climate issues, migration will continue to be a significant part of human experience.“

The title of your exhibition is "BELONGINGS." The word plays on the ambiguity of "possessions" and "the sense of belonging." When a person loses everything material— what is it then that allows them to truly arrive in a new place? 

This is a huge question which I feel ill equipped to answer. It is for those brave enough to migrate somewhere new, who have to leave their belongings and family behind, to answer. I often think about what I would take with me if I migrated to another country. These days a smart phone must be hugely important. Anti- immigration narratives are not new – as we unfortunately know from past and current history. But they are cruel, undermining and inhuman. They make me feel angry and exasperated. These narratives make it clear to you that you are not wanted – you don’t belong. From my experience it seems those who migrate, sacrifice themselves for a better life for their children and grandchildren. And migration is simply part of the story of being human, of survival. From ancient times, peoples have moved from country to country to survive or for a better life. And with global political and climate issues, migration will continue to be a significant part of human experience. We need to think deeply about it and learn to embrace the richness it brings. To think of welcome rather than rejection. So that one day, a young woman like my grandmother migrating to the UK for a better life might truly arrive in a place is where she feels that she belongs. 

„I wanted to mirror this in my work by using steel rather than zinc, which is a rarer metal, for my etching plates. This took me back to ancient alchemists who were trying to turn base metals into gold.“

In your project, you collaborate with the chemist Dr. Amanda Jarvis and replace expensive precious metals in the etching process with simple steel. Can you describe your intentions? 

When I began the project, I knew that Amanda was a ‘Green” chemist – a scientist interested in developing a more sustainable chemistry. This seemed very exciting to me even though I had not studied any chemistry since the age of 13. I was hugely out of my depth in terms of understanding the complex chemistry that Amanda researches in her laboratory. But we were both fascinated by the differences and similarities in our work and work environments and struck up a meaningful dialogue. A laboratory and an artist’s studio are both places of experimentation and imagination, as well as places of rigour and technical skill. Amanda wants to develop a more sustainable chemistry, to make chemical synthesis ‘greener’, particularly, trying to replace precious metals with cheaper, more abundant alternatives, so as to minimise ravaging the earth through mining. I wanted to mirror this in my work by using steel rather than zinc, which is a rarer metal, for my etching plates. This took me back to ancient alchemists who were trying to turn base metals into gold.. In this vein, Amanda mixed up a solution of ‘aqua regia’ which is known for dissolving gold, for me to etch my plates with. The results were unexpected and intriguing – and form the bases of my suite of etchings called Modern Alchemy. 

For "Modern Alchemy," you threw chemicals directly into the aquatint resin to visually freeze a reaction. Can you describe this for the reader? 

In order to achieve dynamic and chemical looking marks on the steel etching plates, I worked in two ways. Firstly I worked in the studio with master printer Nigel Oxley where we laid down a hand shaken aquatint onto both the large and small the steel etching plates onto which I threw chemicals into the resin powder. I have used this technique before on zinc, but on the steel plates we got new chemical reactions which gave us interesting marks. We fixed these marks onto the plate with with heat. We then etched all the plates in nitric acid – again the steel was much harder to etch than zinc, and more unpredictable. When we printed, we couldn’t get any white highlights – the steel only gave grey tones. When I came to finish the larger prints, I used gold leaf to mirror the alchemy and French chalk and hair to get highlights. Secondly, I re-etched the 8 small plates with aqua regia in Amanda’s laboratory to see what further marks we might get. Sometimes the solution just seemed to clean the plates, at other times and strengths, it bit down deep into the metal in unpredictable ways. Sometimes the print and the plate didn’t look like each other which was very strange. This was a most exciting and experimental project. The prints are otherworldly and largely made from chemical reactions. The print processes felt like a sort of alchemy. 

You are showing your new works at the Edinburgh Printmakers. Was it important to work in a place that connects tradition and radical innovation so closely? 

Edinburgh printmakers is an extraordinary place hosting what might be the largest print studio in the world. They have wonderful facilities and expertise to access and learn both traditional and new print technologies. Not only is the physical building magnificent, but everyone I have worked with there has been expert, creative and helpful. As well as showing the two exhibitions in their wonderful galleries, the Director offered me the chance to work with their Head of Editions, Alastair Clark, to make a new print for the exhibition. In my two visits to the print studio, I worked with Alastair to make four new prints using stone and plate lithography as well relief printing. It was a privilege to work with Alastair - a truly creative collaboration, which has opened new possibilities in print for my practice in the future. I am thrilled with the prints we made together which will be available during the exhibition. 

„Once you humanise those seeking sanctuary in another country, I hope it will bring about a new understanding of what it means to seek refuge in a new place.“

What do you hope a visitor feels when standing among your suspended clothes? Is your aim to evoke empathy for today's situation in England by showing that, in the end, we are all seekers of a safe place? 

You can never predict what an audience feels about your work whatever your intention was in making it. But I allow the audience to walk amongst the suspended clothes in the Belongings installation so they can touch them, see the family photos and read the stories embroidered on them. This brings an intimacy to this immersive experience which I hope will evoke empathy for one person’s story of migration. Once you humanise those seeking sanctuary in another country, I hope it will bring about a new understanding of what it means to seek refuge in a new place. I think of Belongings as a provocation to challenge current anti- immigration narratives in the UK today.

Susan Aldworth in her London studio, 2020. Photograph by Louise Crawford