Autoethnography is an approach within academic research and writing which  places personal, lived experience at the centre of its investigations. It recognises that individuals, living at a particular time within a set of conditions peculiar to them, are representative of and relevant to the wider society.The artists in ‘Autoethnos’ each speak out from their own centre of lived knowledge via the visual aspects of material objects. Yet, a material thing may still be in the process of discovering the shape it wishes to present to the world. An object may break down to become a ‘thing’ when it loses its function or take on other meanings due to the emotional connections it adopts. Sculptural things move in and out of recognition and definition. To a certain extent, this might be what the works of all three artists have in common – yet hasty reconciliations and resolutions may prove to be premature.

In approaching ‘Autoethnos’ the viewer is asked to bring their selves opened to the untidier and messier sides of life. Bodies, fragments, associations and damaged goods are on offer so neither refunds nor exchanges may be negotiated.

Susan Diab works across visual art and text and has recently been publishing autoethnographic writing, finding in this approach a way to bridge the two. In devising, curating and making new pieces for ‘Autoethnos’ she is returning to her true artist self as a sculptor conjuring imagined representations of experience via performative and embodied processes brought to bear on physical materials. She is a member of APEC Studios and has exhibited extensively in public settings and with artist-led initiatives.

Caroline Pick is fascinated by the process of capturing the ephemeral moment in solid matter and making it permanent. She is drawn to the use of materials that move from liquid to solid, materials that hold these transient fragile moments. A graduate of Central St. Martin’s and the University of Brighton, she has exhibited widely and her work is in various private collections. She has been selected for an unusual artist’s residency in the Arctic on board ship in June 2018.

Isobel Smith’s practice crosses sculpture, performance and moving image. She seeks to blur the boundaries between rational and non-rational realities to allow seepage, leakage and play across and between them. Colliding materials and ideas, Smith makes powerful mash-ups of the familiar and strange, hybrid half-truths, not-quite-lies. She graduated from RCA Sculpture/Performance in 2017. Her work is being exhibited in Saatchi Gallery’s ‘Known Unknowns’ from 20 March – 24 June 2018.

Isobel Smith will make impromptu performances in the gallery from time to time throughout the exhibition