Kay Le Seelleur Ara
Curiosity Didn’t Kill the Cat
20 September - 01 NovemberOver 100 new paintings since her 2023 solo exhibition at ArtHouse Jersey.Kay Le Seelleur Ara orchestrates a joyfully strange wonderland in paint. Populated by all manner of curious creatures with dark undertones; the familiar and the strange, the diabolic and the angelic, her images are at once hilarious and tragic.
Kay Le Seelleur Ara, Open Wide, Acrylic on board, 2024
Asked about the subject of her paintings Kay Ara simply says “my head is always full of stuff, images just appear and I have to draw them”. Citing instagram as her biggest source of inspiration, this quick witted and restless artist is always on the lookout for possible subjects, piecing together her idiosyncratic tableaux from the visual currency of 75,000 years worth of human made images. Pulling magpie-like all that glitters into her sphere, from Korean ink paintings to minoan sculptures, figures dominate; animal, human or a mixture of both are full of colour and jostling with astonishing vitality. These vibrant works are accompanied by quirky titles that can be witty, silly, naughty, thoughtful or edgy, sometimes referring to contemporary politics, histories of art, everyday occurrences or the people and animals that share Kay’s life. In the same way that Philip Guston drew from both high and low culture Kay Le Seelleur Ara aims to make visible the world as she sees and feels it.
Kay was born in 1941 in St Albans, UK, following her mother’s evacuation from Jersey just before the invasion. She spent her early years during the war with family in the UK before returning to Jersey in 1945 after liberation. Kay found her passion for art and drawing in childhood. She attended Bath Academy of Art between 1958-1962, studying under artists such as Howard Hodgkin, Adrian Heath, Henry Cliffe and Gillian Ayres. Following art school Kay taught art in London and painted sporadically whilst raising her two children.
Kay was born in 1941 in St Albans, UK, following her mother’s evacuation from Jersey just before the invasion. She spent her early years during the war with family in the UK before returning to Jersey in 1945 after liberation. Kay found her passion for art and drawing in childhood. She attended Bath Academy of Art between 1958-1962, studying under artists such as Howard Hodgkin, Adrian Heath, Henry Cliffe and Gillian Ayres. Following art school Kay taught art in London and painted sporadically whilst raising her two children.
Following a fall that broke her hip in 2017, Kay is unable to walk unaided. Whilst this has left her in permanent pain and with limited mobility, she responded to this life-changing incident by establishing a routine of drawing and painting every day. Her output is extraordinary and this exhibition will be the culmination of a single year's work. Whilst the accident left her physically disabled it freed her from the responsibilities of everyday life and her artistic voice gets stronger and brighter with every new painting. Working from an armchair in her living room in Trinity, and a small painting studio in the spare bedroom, Kay now interacts with a global audience for her work through her three instagram accounts. Her instagram accounts are testimony to the dedicated and positive individual she is. Over the last few years she has developed a finely tuned practice of posting the work she completes each day, a diaristic record of her inventive mind and eclectic tastes, continuously honing in on what it is she wants to do as an artist, with a burgeoning style that has gained her a growing and engaged audience of admirers around the world.
Kay’s dedication to her practice is an inspiration for anyone. Kay transcends her physical limitations by tapping into her unconscious; to an imaginary world of frollicking creatures and absurd scenarios; bringing forth an extraordinary and fanciful menagerie that draws from the real world and inspires joy to those who encounter it. In our dream worlds, where the unconscious is not restricted by imposed limitations, we can fly.
