Artist Statement

Aoife Scott’s practice is deeply rooted in her intimate relationship with the natural world. Being a year-round sea swimmer and mountain runner, Scott responds to the landscapes she traverses. She translates her experiences into abstract lines and marks on canvas, paper, and copper, exploring themes of ecological consciousness and human connection to the living world.
 
In her last solo exhibition Solastalgia through the use of particular materials Scott explored a tension between our connection and disconnection to the natural world and our psychological responses to specific environments and ecosystems. She endeavoured to reconnect with nature by tapping into her inner child through play, as childhood can be a time when we feel most connected to the natural world and experience a sense of uninhibited freedom. While the work celebrated the energy and beauty of wilder places, it also looked at the fragility and collapse of these environments. The prevalent view which regards the natural world as a resource to exploit, consume and pollute,  deeply disconnects us from the living world. Scott strives to use colour, energy, material and dissonance in her work to stimulate an important conversation about our responsibilities for personal, collective and planetary well-being.

Currently, Scott is in the early stages of developing a new body of work that explores the elevated landscapes of West Wicklow. Working across painting, printmaking, and drawing, she seeks to convey the deep interconnectedness of these ancient environments, alongside the embodied experience of moving through the ancestral landscape that surrounds her. Rather than simply depicting the land, Scott works in collaboration with it. This approach calls for a shift in mindset, one that involves slowing down, listening more attentively, and entering into a relationship that is interactive rather than extractive. Her paintings and prints are not derived from photographs, nor are they created en plein air. Instead, they emerge from extended periods of immersion within the landscape itself. While walking mountain paths or forest trails, Scott absorbs the changing colours, the texture of the air against her skin, the smells, and the atmosphere. These sensory impressions settle gradually within her, informing the work over time. What emerges is not a representation of a specific place, but an expression of lived experience of multiple landscapes held in the body, and of the subtle energies that resonate from within them.