Michael Armitage and Kudzanai-Violet Hwami on Painting

In this edited transcript of the conversation between Armitage and Hwami at Gasworks, the two artists discuss how painting allows them to navigate their contexts, and the subject matter that allows them to do so.

MA One of the things that I was taken by in this show is the intimacy of the images. They all feel familiar; I can imagine looking back at photos of my own family and they would look very similar to some of these paintings. I was wondering if that was a source that you go to, and if it's important that there's an intimacy to the sources and images that you use?

KVH I think to start off there needs to be that intimacy when making artworks, anyway. It needs to start from a point of direct reference or direct connection, and the images that you see in the show are direct references of my family and people I know, such as my partner. But as much as they are direct references, I also change the narrative and what they mean to me, in a sense.

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Image: Michael Armitage and Kudzanai-Violet Hwami in conversation at Gasworks, London (29 October 2019).