About
Amy Douglas makes small sculptures from broken Staffordshire Flatbacks.......
" It's because I have a tilted uterus" 2016
The Art of Salmagundi is the project of artist and restorer, Amy Douglas. It has been quietly evolving from around 2008. "The idyea of marrage made his hair stand on end ", was the beginning of this project. "Salmagundi" is an old french and middle english word relating to a hodgepodge of things, a mixture and a variety of ingredients.
As an artist her practice involves applied arts and the transformation of broken objects, objects that can tell stories better than people. The broken Staffordshire ceramic figures each have a unique break or loss in the body of the sculpture. This adds an element of serendipity to the project. Each piece had an original theme or identity , Amy adds a twist on the original figurine, and creates a modern surreal story, an opera in the inanimate for our extraordinary times. It takes quite a while to source the perfect broken object , hence the serendipity and pace of the studio practice. That is the objects can't be knocked out commercially .
Amy's bread and butter is to restore ceramics and decorative arts for clients. The job of the restorer is to try and mimic what the artist has done before, to place yourself in the artists past applications, how they made a mark , mixed a glaze. To deceive the modern viewer into believing what they are seeing is work of the past.
Amy started her art career at Edinburgh College of Art in 1991, then trained in The Decorative Arts at The City and Guilds of London Art School ,and has an MA in printmaking from Camberwell College of Art.
Selected Exhibitions
Menargie, Gallery68 , Sept , 2019
Glitter Bunnies, Forartsake, London , May 2019
The Little Shop on Northdown, Margate,2018
Collect 18, Saatchi Gallery,Cynthia Corbett,2018
Young Masters, Pall Mall Gallery, Cynthia Corbett 2017
The Art of Salmagundi : Jack Hanley Gallery, New York Jan, 2016
Art Cologne: Jack Hanley Gallery,2016
Re-animate,repair,meld,mend: BluecoatDisplay Centre,Liverpool ,2015
The Masters:Relief printmaking, Bankside Gallery,London,2015
AAF Battersea: Jamm Gallery,London, 2015
AAF Hampstead:Jamm Gallery,London, 2014
The Art of Salamagundi:Brixi,Brixton,London 2013
Maggs beneath the covers: Maggs Bros,Mayfair,London, 2012
Out of the Box : No Formatt Gallery,London, 2012
Precious: Brighton & Hove Museum 2008