Clementine McGaw
My work deals with subjects such as Georgio Agamben's theories on Bare Life and the ideas based around the notion of Homo Sacer. I explore the ways in which humans, for millions of years have easily eliminated groups of people which they find disposable and undesirable, in other words their 'life' is no more than that of a plant or an animal and ultimately desensitises and dehumanised as part of a process through manipulation and desensitisation.
I am also interested in the human condition and how the human mind can been manipulated by higher authority in specific conditions, i.e war, makes the most innocent and caring of humans capable of even the most inhumane acts of terrorism and how one person can qualify a human life.
I use authentic images of Prisoners of War, Genocide, Ethnic Cleansing, the Holocaust, My Lai Massacre. I use gloss and oil paint and the paintings are always large (48" x 60"), the process of painting is very important as it allows emotion to become injected back into the lifeless characters of some of the worlds most terrorised human beings often if not always conflicted by their fellow men.
Her Current works focus on the human condition and she is particularly fascinated with the theories connected to Bare Life, specifically the writings of Georgio Agamben.
Clementine confronts issues that deal with the politics of war, the power of the Sovereign State and the State of exception.
Making paintings from authentic photographs which captures images of suffering and torture, this includes Prisoners of War, Genocide, Ethnic Cleansing and Massacres. She uses the process of painting to encapsulate the sufferers emotion.
Clementine also challenges the morality of the authentic images whilst highlighting the suffering and pain through the language of paint.
Prisoner series
Oil/gloss on canvas - 48x60"
Boy with Blanket-Africa
Oil and gloss on canvas - 60"x48"