Weekly Inspiration: Kitty Callaghan

I first heard of Kitty Callaghan through an i-D Vice article that was shared on Facebook. The cover photo looked really surreal and interesting, a collage of photos cleverly put together to create a scene that flowed.

The article was an interview with Kitty and it was really nice to read about her life in Australia, growing up in the country and her adult life in the city. 
What I liked particularly about the interview is that she revealed her biggest inspiration is the female body. She uses female figures in a lot of her pieces, creating fantastical worlds surrounding these figures. Nude figures are often the focus- but not in a distasteful way, giving new meaning to femininity. I also gained respect for her following her opinions on gender and why it is important to give female artists recognition. She highlights how women are still seen in a sexist light and that it is rare to hear a man referred to as a male artist, where as women can be labelled as female artists a lot - particularly in the music world. Her feminist views on life clearly come across in her work and I love how she makes the female form her focus and recurring theme, showing the beauty and strength of women.

Her actual work method was fascinating to me as collage is not something I am too familiar with or able to do. Using a combination of found imagery and photos, textures and paint, she creates nostalgic images. Her secret to this is something really original that I found really inspirational. Kitty often visits a camera shop near to her to raid the photos that have never been claimed - often finding pictures from the 70's which she uses in her work often. Her resourcefulness is something I have really taken on board, showing that found imagery can come from anywhere and all you have to do is ask to get free, useful stuff that would otherwise go to waste.

What I find most inspirational about Kitty is the way she has taken a method used often her in primary school art classes, so a skill she has honed over the years, and adapted to become a successful artist in her own right. She works with fashion brands often, for example Elle and Woolmark, due to her focus on the female body, as obviously fashion has the same focus.

Something I really want to do after finding out about Kitty is experiment more with collage as I have never really had the opportunity or felt I had the composition skills for it as I am used to digital work. I am also really inspired to take my own photos to use as this is a method Kitty uses often, using her friends to take photos and incorporate into her work.