Emily Speed -Wednesday Lectures

Liverpool based artist Emily Speed was born in Chester in 1979. Best known for her architectural based performative works, however she thinks of herself as a watercolour painter, she achieved her BA Drawing and Painting at the Edinburgh College of Art in 2001. Then later achieved her MA Fine Art Drawing at Wimbledon College of Art in 2006.

Speed includes various architectural themes in her work. Recently she has been commissioned to do lots of performance based pieces such as ‘A Parade of Architectural Commas’ for the Yorkshire sculpture park, which included 5 building costumes roaming around the park for the day. The name of the piece may be to do with how you read the world in front of you, maybe sometimes when you see something like a building (comma) you have to take a short pause and take in your surroundings.

Overall I’m not too sure what I think about Emily Speed and her work. I don’t understand the link between the architecture in her work and the art itself. Contrary to the work of Amy Sillman, Speed’s abstract work doesn’t humour me or interest me at all. I appreciate the artistic work that goes into making and producing the pieces for the performances and the choreography that goes alongside it but overall it doesn’t spark my interest.