Sarah Boulter
Sarah Boulter's etchings focus on ritual and routine as well as private and public performance, following a loosely based biographical narrative. Sarah’s work alludes to a sense of the sleazy opulence of the unknown city and encounters within it. The work is a heightened version of self-portraiture depicting the mundane yet intimate details of daily life. She considers the innate currency of certain attributes, looking in particular at the appeal of the ultra-feminine: this modern, internet-driven, female aspirational character in opposition to the desire for reassurance and validation sought through social media and real-life relationships. Sarah studies behaviour in the private space and the impact of an outsider encroaching upon it. She considers a lack of genuine intimacy in a world ever more intimacy obsessed, where a need for confession makes for confusing, disappointing, and entertaining occurrences. Attention is paid to the painstakingly deliberate rituals of dressing, making up, and doing hair. We see the embarrassing and the idiosyncratic; the poignancy of an absentminded sniff of bedsheets before they are thrown in the washing machine after a night with a lover and the resigned discomfort of listening to the sound of a stranger vomiting in the next room. By using commonplace or even unpleasant incidents as a platform for something more glamorous, Sarah veers into an arena of tongue-in-cheek self-obsession and life as performance. Biography Sarah Boulter graduated from studying Chinese as a language in 2004 and spent extensive time in China and Japan before working as a lawyer in London. She is currently undertaking a MA in Contemporary Fine Art at Salford. Sarah was included in 'How do We Look' at International 3 in March 2017. She was awarded a British Council Fellowship to work at Venice Biennial in 2017. She is a member of the artist collective Night Shift.