Picturing Him

Picture this: close your eyes and imagine him. What appears? For me,nothing. No image, no form. I have aphantasia, an inability to visualize in my mind’s eye. I cannot summon the ideal man, a fantasy, or even a memory as a picture. And yet,
I can describe him. I can paint him and show you on the canvas.


'Picturing Him' is a series of paintings exploring the male form through a queer lens, shaped by my experience of aphantasia.
The collection centres on both my own personal desires and observations surrounding the concept of 'him' and the tension between fantasy and my visual memory. Rather than being predetermined, each composition is built through both external references, a process of layering, and
discovered amongst gestural mark making intuitively with paint. This mixture of deliberate and unstable visuals reflects how I translate on the canvas personal experiences, and what I find erotic with no 'minds eye' to visually recall them. An approach that allows me to create fresh and
expressive paintings, highlighting not the limits, but the creativity my Aphantasia enables me.
Picturing becomes abstract and an ongoing negotiation to capture my desire of the male form. A celebration of paint, my sexuality, and how I create as a neuro-diverse artist. An exhibition I believe can become the opening of a widening
conversation in art of being queer, but also about
aphantasia.