Material Conversations with our Dazed Club Artists in Residence

“Arriving here felt like opening a window. The studio has this calm but energising atmosphere.” Yahvi Duggal has spent the past 2 months immersed in an intensive period of creation, living and working alongside 7 other artists at Mason & Fifth, Westbourne Park. Chosen from over 800 applicants for the first Mason & Fifth x Dazed Club residency, the artists were challenged to create art relating to themes of identity, memory, and place for the final exhibition, ‘Material Conversations’, curated by Hanna ter Meulen. Working with everything from textiles and kitchen waste to photography and oil paints, each artist brought their own unique practice, history, and experience of the residency into their work.

As a writer who has long been fascinated with how space and place influence and inspire artists across all genres, I was keen to chat to some of the artists about how their work is shaped by their environment in both immediate and more conceptual ways. 

Yahvi’s sustainable practice involves repurposing food waste. She works with materials produced locally, allowing her art to be both inspired and shaped by the environment she happens to be in. During the residency, she had access to the in-house restaurant, Canal, which she describes as “a gift” facilitating her process. A vision for her art would be formed during her daily ritual of heading down to the kitchen to collect that day’s food waste. “It has been a deeply connected way of working where materials and making live side by side,” she says. She takes everything from corn husks to onion skins, transforming them into handwoven textiles. “These materials shape the colours, textures, and even the direction of the work. It’s like collaborating with the seasons, the menu, and the unexpected.” It results in an intimate relationship between the final artwork and the space in which it was produced; adapting to the availability of materials and the challenge of never knowing in advance what waste products she’ll get her hands on. 

For fellow residency artist, Meenakashi Ghadial, this interdependent relationship between the work and the place in which it was created continues long after each piece is completed. She works in oil painting on scrap metal, sourced free from local scrapyards, businesses, and even friends. This process requires her to sand down each metal canvas, make a pencil sketch, and treat it with an alkyd medium before she can begin to introduce the oil paint. “Oil paintings on metal won’t be able to be conserved in the same way that oil paintings on canvas can,” she explains. “It gives the work a sense of fragility. The inconvenient nature of the material allows the work to take up space in a more peculiar way […] I feel I am in an everlasting relationship with it.” From sourcing to creating to exhibiting the art, the materials used to produce it will necessarily never travel too far from their original location, being changed by their environment over time. “The fact my work cannot be transported easily means that the art I produce is more connected to the geographical location that I made it in.” The mutability of the work means all the places it moves through, from creation to exhibition, leave their mark on it in visible and imperceptible ways; it wears its own history.

Yahvi and Meenakashi both have unique approaches which result in artwork created in direct collaboration with their surroundings, but the influence of space and place on art can be far less tangible. I spoke with French-Turkish residency artist, Deniz Bedir, about the ways in which travelling to new places and working from unfamiliar spaces impacts his art. “It takes time in my work for the influence to come out,” he says, explaining how he’ll often only realise the lingering inspiration of the broader setting much later. “But it plants seeds for the future [which] flourish over time.” 

Deniz creates large scale pieces in what he describes as “a pictorial practice somewhere between bas-relief and fresco using construction materials,” producing artwork and installations that can fill entire rooms. “Sometimes I don’t get the luxury to get a space that fits my practice [but] I have to adapt and figure out how to make it happen anyway.” He prioritises working out how physical space guides the artwork, figuring out how to produce large-scale pieces within its limitations, and allows the conceptual influence of the places he works in to percolate and emerge later.

Maximiliano Ruelas is an interdisciplinary artist from Mexico working with textile and garment-making processes. Coming to London for the residency was an opportunity to further experiment with how he incorporates places into his work, both materially and intellectually. He takes a wide-angle view of the influence of environment on his work, sharing that his process, research, and the inspiration for his art “completely changes” when creating in a new country.

“Before even coming to London, I had decided that the project I would do here would have to relate and connect to the context I was in.” He knew he wanted to make something that was tied to the UK. “I stumbled upon a material called Gutta Percha, that played a big part in English history and dominion during the Victorian era. From there, I developed my entire project.” The textiles he’s working with have their own histories; each of his creations becomes a deliberate product of the sociocultural context in which it was created.

Meenakashi shares that beyond creating work that is in direct conversation with its environment, her work also deals with the confluence between personal identity and travelling to new places. “As a Punjabi lesbian, and the first second-generation immigrant in my family, my work is extremely informed by my multifaceted identity.” Living an 8-hour flight from home has given her an intimate familiarity with moving and searching for belonging that is infused in her work.  “Space and place has always been an important element in my work,” she says. “Finding spaces that feel safe for me has been a lifelong struggle […] I’ve spent most of my life running away in some capacity, and I am still looking for what feels like home.” This feeling of searching and sense of restlessness shows up in her work. Her subjects exist in dialogue with their surroundings; getting into showers and out of cars, moving through crowds and interacting with their personal belongings. She shares that one of her motivations behind her choice of canvas is that modes of transportation are made of metal, with movement and transportation being themes she returns to.

During the residency, the artists were not only transported to a new city and new studio, but also sharing their creative workspace with fellow residents in a way that shook up their typically more isolated practice.  Yahvi says that the camaraderie between the artists was a source of inspiration, where ideas bounced around over shared stories and exchanged skills. “I will miss the conversations most. Those exchanges often left me seeing my process in a whole new light. That kind of daily energy is hard to recreate.” Each artist brought their own experiences and creativity into the experience, creating a unique space to work where they could feed off the energy of one another and their new environment. “I will miss my fellow artists and all the workers of Mason & Fifth,” Deniz says. “It was such an amazing experience to be here since the opening of the hotel.” 

While the Mason & Fifth x Dazed Club residency has now concluded, its impact lives on in both the artists and the space itself. “Living and working with all my fellow artists has given me friends for life,” Maximiliano says. “I’m very grateful to have been given this opportunity.” Each of the 8 residents has donated an artwork created during their stay to live on the walls at Mason & Fifth, Westbourne Park. 

Check out all of the artists who took part below, or swing by Mason & Fifth, Westbourne Park to see their pieces displayed throughout the building. And be sure to follow @masonfifth for news of upcoming residency opportunities.

Daniel Santangelo, Deniz Bedir, Maximiliano Ruelas, Meenakashi Ghadial, Susan Kellaway, Tonique Adacia
, Yahvi Duggal, Yasmina Hilal.