Anya Hassett

Raid.R Reporter Caitlin Dawkes in digital conversation with WCA (Wimbledon College of Arts) BA Sculpture Graduate, Anya Hassett.

Anya Hassett works with digital and sculptural manipulations to distort familiar surroundings resulting in a warped documentation of the contents of her flat in a series called Stock Take: A Review of Assets. We discuss how isolation can alter the creative process and how domestic objects can reveal themselves to be works of art.

*Stock Take: Self Portrait (Drowning in Assets), Digital Collage, 2020. Image Courtesy of Anya Hassett.*

Caitlin Dawkes: First of all, thank you so much for doing this interview with me! I’m excited to learn more about Stock Take and your practice.

Anya Hassett: No problem at all, I am looking forward to discussing things with you! Thanks for taking an interest in Stock Take and taking the time to learn more about it.

CD: Within your body of work, there seems to be a sudden shift to exploring the everyday object, what was the particular moment that sparked the idea of using everyday objects within your work? In other words, what inspired you to create the Stock Take series?

AH: You’re right, there was a very sudden shift. Before Stock Take: A Review of Assets I was often led by material, process, and aesthetic rather than everyday objects. When COVID-19 hit, and we had to leave our studios and relocate to finishing our sculpture degrees at home I was so stunted and struggled to keep the momentum up without access to workshops, technicians, and studio space. I tried continuing working on the works I had been focused on in the studio before the pandemic hit but it wasn’t feeling right.

I then tried to change my approach and focus on what I had available rather than what I had lost in terms of making. Then I realised I had a flat full of objects that were already made. Initially I began by taking stock of everything around me by documenting everything individually, taking a photograph and labelling it. I then isolated each object on Photoshop and spent a while playing around until I got to the stage of animating everything on After Effects and making the final video. With each object becoming an asset to both living and making during that time, hence the name Stock Take: A Review of Assets. The process happened quite naturally and under a slight sense of hysteria. This meticulous documentation of the contents of my one bed London flat I share with my partner, Joe, and our dog, Toddy, kept me walking on a fine line of sanity and madness.

For my final degree submission, we got marked holistically on our sketchbooks and works over the final year but also on proposals for degree show in lieu of a real thing. This was a very fun stage, and I made some plans I am yet to materialise when the opportunity comes round.

Stock Take: A Review of Assets was totally born out of the pandemic and was a direct response to being an artist during such crazy times, globally, when the boundaries of all of our lives shrunk so dramatically at once.

Stock Take: A Review of Assets, Video (2mins), 2020. Video Courtesy of Anya Hassett.

CD: If we were in an alternate timeline, would your practice have shifted to everyday objects? Was the domestic space always an interest within your practice? How did lockdown impact your practice?

AH: I am not 100% sure, that’s a good question. I think being in art school I always wanted to make the most of workshops and new materials and collecting skills to go forth with so I probably, naively, disregarded using everyday objects somewhat. This stark change in environment and being confined to my flat heightened my interest in everyday objects.

I have always been interested in the domestic space; be it architectural interventions, furniture, decorative objects, beds. When I am researching a project or seeking inspiration it often lies within the bounds of the domestic – furniture makers, innovative textiles and materials used within interiors, fashion. My personal domestic space is very important to me, as a place of safety, peace, and creating a world where you can be comfortable in.

In 2018-2019 I collaborated with artist Martha Scott, which culminated in big puffy colourful furniture that was designed to playfully and awkwardly position the body within performance. For my dissertation I wrote essays comparing the comfort and in turn discomfort between the space beneath a duvet and being within a body of water. I have done countless drawings and sculptural works based on the body’s presence within domestic space. I think it’s only natural that I then allowed the objects I have brought into my domestic space to take centre stage in my practice, too.

Lockdown impacted my practice more than I could have imagined. Lockdown slowed me down and made me stop to re-evaluate what excited me with making work, it allowed me to spend months focusing on one project (which felt so luxurious compared to the fast-paced nature of a final year Fine Art degree), I felt less pressure to be rushing onto the next big idea and be constantly making something better and bolder. It made me stop and learn editing and animation, of which I knew very little about before. I am coming out of lockdown feeling both invigorated by changing my practice up and also slightly stunted with a pressure to speed things up and have more creative output – but maybe that’s a constant internal battle.

Stock Take: Asset Ensemble, Animated GIF, 2020. Image Courtesy of Anya Hassett.

CD: I love how the objects seem to take on a life of their own through the animation, how do you think this motion changes how we view the everyday objects that surround us?

AH: I wanted the animation of the objects to reflect how I felt looking at the same things everyday in lockdown. How after looking at something for too long, it starts to move and wobble, like when you stare at a word for too long and it becomes a jumble of letters on a page, well at least it does for me. I think the animation allowed each of the assets to become characters, dancing and moving alone or in tandem with one another. Each moves slightly differently.

When I was making the animations, I sent one over to my Grandma of a Domestos bleach bottle (she is a huge lover of the stuff, and there is no household problem a bottle of Domestos can’t fix!), and she replied saying what great hips and movement it had. Like it had been totally personified and this simple bottle of bleach was suddenly some great mover- I really loved this as it showed it wasn’t just me giving these everyday objects their own characters.

CD: I am curious to know at what point in the works generation does the everyday object turn into an art object? Can you talk me through the process of transforming everyday objects into art objects? In other words, what was the process for generating Stock Take?

AH: That’s an interesting point and was something I wrestled with quite a lot whilst making Stock Take. I feel, for me, taking these objects out of their context and everyday use, placing them together with other assets sparks up different relationships, not just intended use but form, colour, and character. In Stock Take, the assets simultaneously act as everyday objects and art objects, and I intentionally didn’t want to warp or animate them too much so that they wouldn’t be recognisable in the everyday domestic setting. This dichotomy of meaning each asset embodies is essential for me; that the series sometimes looks like a somewhat mundane cataloguing of the contents of my flat, whilst also being a playful use of available materials and resources.

CD: Now that you've made the Stock Take series, how has your relationship to everyday objects changed? Have you become more connected to the objects in your surroundings? Why is that?

AH: I have definitely become more connected with the objects in my home, looking back at Stock Take it feels like a kind of love letter to the objects that made up the world around me when the external world went on pause. Stock Take is almost a time capsule into what was a very strange time, which I look back at both fondly and with slight discomfort.

Formil, a cardboard carton of Non-Bio laundry detergent from Lidl, was an asset that I kept returning to and I have even shown a warped still of it as a sculptural work last October. I became quite attached to Formil, as it became a big character in my work, as it warped so well with its bright colours and typography. When it ran out, I went to replenish my stocks at Lidl and to my horror the design on the box had (slightly) changed and I had a momentary panic as I had become so connected with the previous packaging.

*Stock Take: Formil Non-Bio, Image, 2020. Image Courtesy of Anya Hassett.*

*Stock Take: Formil Slumped, Installation View, 2020. Image Courtesy of Anya Hassett*

Ever since I started documenting and animating the objects in my flat for Stock Take, I often think how other objects would warp as if I’m seeing all the things around me with a Stock Take lens. As my flat has accrued more objects over time, I have to draw the line and not constantly warp each thing, as I think the context of it being the contents of a domestic dwelling during a limited time period is stronger than a never ending thread of assets. Saying that though, we did recently just get a new (old) car that I am itching to animate.

CD: From your perspective, how do you think COVID-19 has affected the art world for the future generation of artists?

AH: COVID-19 has definitely meant an increased need for artists to have a digital presence, and artists’ practices becoming more reliant upon technology, like how my practice had to adapt to be seen through a computer screen. But then again, I definitely have a yearning for the tactility of works, and to be in the physical presence of artworks to touch them or see their texture in real life or be dwarfed by their size – none of that is the same through a screen. The deprivation of seeing physical works has for sure heightened my senses for when we are able to go to shows and exhibitions again.

CD: What was the top nugget of advice that you heard from your time at Wimbledon or prior?

AH: Probably playing with materials and trying not to get too stagnant or stuck in one-way of approaching work. What was amazing at Wimbledon was the constant easy access to facilities (foundry, woodwork, metalwork, print labs and tech suites), which meant you could always explore more whilst making a work, and that engagement was vital to expanding a works limitations / boundaries.

I really cherish my time at Wimbledon after being the penultimate fine art cohort at that campus. It’s a crippling shame that the sculpture and fine art legacy at Wimbledon is being squashed, for what appears to be the financial gain of a huge art education university like UAL. But I think the struggles of fighting for our space and needs whilst facing imminent course closure taught us all a lot of resilience and ingenuity, which we will definitely need in our art careers ahead.

CD: What have you been up to since leaving the BA Sculpture course at Wimbledon? Do you have any upcoming projects/work in the making to promote? What's happening in Anya Hassett's art world?

AH: Since graduating, I have been working as the studio assistant for Mary McCartney. Around working I am trying to carve out time for my own practice. I have a few works in the making at the moment and I’m also continuing on developing Stock Take: A Review of Assets as I really want to be able to show it physically some more. But in general, just looking forward to the world opening up again to go to exhibitions and shows and allow inspiration to drip feed in.

QUICK FIRE

What is your favourite object in your home?

This has been much harder than it probably should have been. There is a handmade chessboard my partner and I got on a trip to Berlin, or a drop leaf red table I got from my Grandparents a few years ago, or a shell sent to me by my sister mid-lockdown from the coast I grew up by in Blackpool. But our flat wouldn’t be ours without our dog, Toddy – I have tried animating a photo of him, but he just looked like a heap of wobbling porridge!

What online space do you turn to for an 'art/culture fix'?

Instagram, The Guardian, AnOther Magazine, The Face, I-D, Dazed

Normal objects or Warped Objects?

Warped, every time!

Offline or online art experiences?

Definitely offline

Do you make artwork in the day or night?

Whenever I can fit it in, and a flurry of energy and excitement arrives.

What is your favourite gallery?

I love Hepworth, Wakefield and Southwark Park Galleries, London

Where can we find you online?

Website: anyahassett.com