Video transcript
ARTEXPRESS 2024 - Student interview - 02. Elyse Pulbrook

ELYSE PULBROOK: Hi. My name's Elyse Pulbrook, and I study visual arts at The Jannali High School.

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My body of work explores ideas of identity and the deterioration of identity but also the safety of the home and memories of my childhood and my experiences and just how my house and my home and my environment has kind of shaped my personal identity.

At the beginning of my artist process, I was really stuck on what to do and just really confused about where to start. I was just kind of just looking around and just thinking about different symbols that kind of portray my identity and portray what makes up my identity. And then I was kind of just experimenting with different mediums, going through just paint on canvas and just different ways I can express my themes and my concepts and what I wanted to convey.

Well, it originally started with just the window. And then I was kind of playing with ideas of entrapment. And then I just kind of thought, 'Why not keep going with that with the door?' And then it kind of morphed into this just exploration of my home and just the different elements within it.

During my artmaking practice, I looked a lot into triptychs, 3-panel pieces, and just kind of deterioration was really where I started, deterioration of identity and then looking at artists that did that through their works. And then I kind of went into ideas about, 'How can I do that using different mediums and using more unique mediums?' which is where I found liquid latex. And then I kind of researched more about that, looking at artists that really delve into liquid latex. And I found Heidi Bucher, who was my main inspiration, as well as Do Ho Suh, who were big inspirations for my piece. And I saw how Heidi used latex as she kind of invented the technique of skinning, which is what I've kind of emulated here in using latex on my home.

With all the pieces, I just used a paintbrush and just a big bucket of liquid latex. And I literally just painted it right on in many different layers until it was feeling strong enough to hold its shape without drooping too much or without being too thin or delicate. And then I would just-- I'd just peel it off the wall or off the window or off the object that I chose to do. I'd just peel it right off, and it came off quite seamlessly.

As you'll notice with the door, I did it onsite at my childhood home, and I did it completely in its natural kind of space. And it was all-- most of it was done outside.

Latex is not really a common medium, so it was quite expensive to buy and actually source. It worked quite perfectly. I was pretty lucky with how it went. It all just kind of worked out. I just kind of-- this was my first go. I didn't really have too much trial and error with it. I just kind of did it, and it just kind of luckily worked out.

My art teacher was a very important entity to this project. She really gave me quite a bit of support but also a lot of trust in doing it at home and just kind of throwing this random idea at her and concepts and material that she was really not familiar with. It was the first time we were kind of both going through this process together.

If I had some advice for visual arts students through the HSC, I would suggest just going through the motions. Just really experiment with what you want. Really research about different materials and just about different themes, and do something quite personal to you because I feel like that works the best in your motivation as well.

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