Press

Glasgow Artist Kate Davis is soon to exhibit at Tate Britain, and Steve Cairns speaks to her about working with the world famous institution.

Steven Cairns How do you feel about being next in the line-up of the Tate’s impressive ‘Art Now’ series?

Kate Davis I’m really pleased to be given this opportunity, especially as the Tate is such an important and significant institution in terms of its collection and what they are doing with younger artists.

SC Will you be exhibiting new work?

KD Yes. The show is called Your Body is a Battleground Still, a new body of work made specifically for the context of the Tate. It’s an interpretation of a piece of work in the Tate collection, ‘Torso in Metal’ from ‘The Rock Drill’ by Jacob Epstein, which was made at the beginning of the 20th century. It’s a bronze sculpture, although it was originally a much larger piece; the work that remains is an incomplete version of its former self.

SC The ‘Art Now’ space is quite large. Do you feel daunted in filling it with your work?

KD No, I feel excited more than daunted. It is a really good size and that offers real possibilities within it. I’ve been to different shows there and seen how the space is very flexible, I will be altering it a bit.

SC Do you think that the Tate’s reputation has affected the way you have approached this work?

KD It has affected it in two ways. The support you get from the Tate or an institution like that really enables you to be ambitious with the work, so that’s been great. The other impact I suppose would be my work in recent years has been related to different aspects of art history; trying to reassess it and use specific visual languages to say something that’s relevant ad important today. The Tate offered a real wealth of work to think about. I wanted to respond to Epstein’s futurist vision of man as it’s an intriguing work that still has relevance today.

Kate Davis, Your Body is a Battleground Still, Tate Britain London, Sat 3-Sun 25 Mar