Bianca Hendicott - Artist
My research has been centered on the ephemeral nature of light in physics and photosynthesis, along with a fascination for the botanical reproductive system and cultural botanical mapping. It consists of prints, film, poetry, sculpture and multi-media. Using flowers as symbols for colonial cultivation, for instance, I explore the tense and dynamic colonial and post-colonial relationships that exist in my own heritage. Having grown up in South Africa and ‘returning’ to the United Kingdom, I consider the often forgotten white diaspora and the importance of embracing layers of cultural identity through the national and colonial symbolism of flowers and traditional crafts. Other significant influences in the work include the idea of the Victorian garden, global capitalism as well as flesh: sensual and biologically sexual. Thus, the flower takes on wider social paradigms and exposes alternative or forgotten cultural narratives.