Interview: Beatrice Haines, Centrespace

Beatrice Haines spent last month as artist-in-residence at Centrespace, the city-centre gallery tucked away down a snaking alley in the heart of Bristol’s mediaeval Old City. And this month, Beatrice is sharing her thought-provoking contemporary vision of the Old City, inviting visitors to delve into the multi-faceted urban world of its centuries-old streets.

Beatrice strives to draw our eyes towards things previously overlooked in order to expose their innate strangeness and beauty – her work transforms objects “often viewed with disgust or thought to be mundane”, studying them in such details they become “hyper-objects with the status of relics.”

“When my grandmother died, I became fascinated by her cherished possessions left behind,” Beatrice explains. “Each object acquired a new poignancy, while her house took on the role of a museum of personal antiquities and a proof of her existence. I held onto her memory by recording as many objects and traces as I could: scuffs on the carpet, tea stains, strands of hair left in her comb.

“Since this experience, my artwork has been heavily influenced by traces. Although humans are often absent in my work, objects left behind tell their own story. My work aims to explore and re-appropriate things perceived as banal, insignificant and sometimes unattractive.”

During her residency at Centrespace – surrounded as it is by Bristol’s very oldest streets, churches and portions of mediaeval city wall – Beatrice has been creating site-specific artwork in response to her historic surroundings. “My practice is predominantly based on the human trace, so I have been exploring this area and discovering traces left behind, suggest both modern and historic narratives,” she explains.

For one previous artwork, Beatrice collected hundreds of pieces of bubble gum stuck to desks at a secondary school, casting them into bronze, complete with pupils’ teeth impressions and finger prints, before returning them to their original positions.

During her Centrespace residency, and for this exhibition, she’s been using a similar method: studying, scrutinizing and celebrating pieces of evidence left behind that leave their imprint on the environment, documenting our interactions with the urban landscape – cable ties wrapped around lamp posts, scuff marks on the floor and chips in the pavement. Beatrice: “I hope this will offer an anthropological insight into the history of this area of Bristol.”

And what has Beatrice noticed during her travels around the Old City? “Many methods for protecting historic architecture from vandalism and birds; from grilles on windows to pigeon spikes and netting draped over statues or sometimes entire buildings. It seems strange that many of the buildings to which these preventative methods are applied are consequently undermined by the very thing that means to protect them.

“Aside from that, though, Bristol is clearly a place much loved and championed by its inhabitants. Much of the artwork I have produced during my residency highlights the locals’ love for the city through these protective methods which symbolise their embrace of their surroundings.” 

Beatrice’s exhibition Peace Comes from Small Things is at Centrespace, Bristol from September 5-16, 11am-6pm daily. For more info, visit www.centrespacegallery.com/exhibitions

Pics: Doug Jewell