FIONA DENT

Biography

Fiona’s training includes a Fine Art, Higher National Diploma from Bucks and Chilterns’ University and shorter courses including painting at the Slade and figure sculpture at the Art Academy, London; she also has a LLB Honours (Law degree) and a post graduate diploma in socio-legal studies. All qualifications were studied for part time while continuing to work full time and bringing up her son.

Her mixed career reflects her long term commitment to social change and human rights: She has had the opportunity to work with many people in very challenging situations such those within the criminal justice system, those who are homeless, people with addictions and victims of trauma.

Her experience of working alongside such a variety of people over the years has influenced her art greatly; her experience of the pain of some people’s lives, and also the life in some people, bursts out through her art work.

Artist statement

For an art work to mean something to the viewer it has to communicate in some way, preferably without the need for supporting text. Fiona’s intention, in making art, is to trigger something in people that stops them in their tracks and makes them think about the bigger picture in life. Human rights are often removed from peoples lives deftly, discreetly and in the name of the ‘greater good.’

The removal of human rights from women and children, particularly, concerns this artist, because of it’s global sweep and the complex construct of ‘denial’ that surrounds it. Even the wealthiest, most developed countries have gaping blind spots on sexism and it’s corrosive effects.

Following nearly 30 years of legislation in the UK, still, their has been no successful prosecution of an abuser who inflicts Female Genital Mutilation on a child. What better way to tell a child she is worthless and that her lone voice counts for nothing? What better way to keep the future woman down, ‘to keep her in her place’? What better way to ensure obediance than to castrate her?

Fiona’s art practice frequently combines both conceptual and representational approaches and she is constantly seeking ways to express and explore complex ideas such as the abuse of power in relationships and more broadly within cultures. Her art is deeply bound to what she has seen and experienced in life.