In June 2025 I founded the Trans+ Identities Art Collective, a group comprising myself and 4 other students from the Open college of the arts with a shared interest in celebrating gender diversity through art.
My personal motivation comes from my trans daughter Chloe and a desire to use my practice to promote trans visibility and acceptance for her, and the wider gender diverse community.
The Trans+ Identities Art Collective are working towards a joint exhibition in Torrevieja in Autumn 2026.
Read our manifesto below, and find out more about us and our work in Instagram.
Manifesto of the Trans+ Identities Art Collective
We are a group of multimedia visual artists located across Europe brought together by a desire to effect positive cultural change for the global gender diverse community.
- Our collective will celebrate gender diversity in all its forms across different cultures.
- In an era of injustice, inequality and misinformation, we will provide a platform for gender diverse voices to be heard. We will work with local and international communities whilst also drawing on our personal experiences as gender diverse artists, close relatives and allies.
- We will show that gender diversity exists in all sections of society and that it has a historical and spiritual context.
- By providing insight into gender diverse lives, we will amplify the visibility of transgender people within the public consciousness, highlighting their lived experiences and achievements.
- We will broaden understanding of gender by inviting our audiences to question what gender identity and gender transition mean to them.
Colour and identity
On 31 January 2025 I held a weaving workshop for GCSE and A-Level art and design students at ELIS Villamartin International school. It gave students the opportunity to learn a new skill whilst demonstrating application and understanding of the elements of artistic practice.
The students’ input formed part of my degree show “Color e Identidad – Una celebración de Torevieja”, involving the community and contributing to my research into the relationship between identity and place.
The main activity was to produce individual weavings using a colour palette chosen by the students to express their feelings towards their location (shown above right).
For the extension activity, students worked in small groups responding to a 3-dimensional weaving frame. Again the brief was to relate their responses to their locality and feelings towards it.
Audio offers an alternative perspective on cultural expression. As a data source it reflects the natural and built environment as well as cultural activities such as the funfair and the beach.
To visualise the sound recordings, I collaborated with data analyst Tristram Cox, who wrote a program using Google Colaboratory. Using the tool, I was able to analyse sections of each recording breaking down the sounds into different constituents to reveal self similarity and patterns which would otherwise be impossible to discern.
What appeals to me about these images is how they change and develop over time, so I have chosen to display them as a sequenced slideshow overlaid onto the section of sound recording to which they refer.
This is an ongoing line of enquiry and I have also been experimenting with projection of the images onto different textured surfaces.
Below: Sound recording and projections of visualisations of sounds recordings from Playa de los Náufragos.
Initiated by artist Julie Bancroft, the project involved fabric scraps that had been previously buried underground and partially decomposed. By dispersing these tiny elements across the world and inviting artists to respond in any way they wished, Julie sought to extended her inquiry into the natural cycle of hope and transformation observed in her own investigations.
My interpretation - transformation through salt accretion
The salt extraction industry is emblematic of Torrevieja, influencing the geographical and cultural landscape (see images of the salt lake below), so I chose to experiment with salt accretion.
After some experimentation I found a method to grow salt crystals onto the fabric fragments, transforming them into mini-sculptures. As well as informing Julie’s practice, the process taught me about transformation of both the visual and tactile qualities of the cloth in response to my local environment, reflecting the impact of people and their culture on this region of SE Spain.
