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Name: Kateryna Pavlyuk

School: Tiffin Girls' School

Town: Kingston Upon Thames KT2 5PL

County: Surrey

Year: Year 13

Inspiration: Despite being an ardent artist, I fear the paintbrush. Most other artistic tools – pencils, spatulas, tjantings – I can generally manipulate to work in my favour; but not paintbrushes. Despite this, in regards to artistic influence, I am inspired largely by painters in particular, ranging from the sporadic, lively, abstract works of Leonid Afremov and Quaing Huang, to the mesmerising beauty and realism of pre-Raphaelite paintings – notably ‘The Lady of Shalott’ by John William Waterhouse. However it is in textiles and texture that my true artistic interests lie – mediums with depth, dimension and substance – for I feel that they enable utmost artistic experimentation and often result in unanticipated wonderful visual outcomes. I believe that often, spontaneity is the trigger for great artworks.

Title: Кукурудза: Bling Edition

Description: This sculpture was inspired by a canvas I painted, in which the central, focal point was a corn on a cob. I then derived further influence from the artist Ai Weiwei’s installation at the Tate Modern, in which an entire room was filled with individual sunflower seeds – each one hand-made using porcelain. I was intrigued by the concept of creating a sculpture that aesthetically duplicates a real item with extremely high verisimilitude. I also mirrored Ai Weiwei’s dedication to his sculpture in terms of undergoing a time-consuming and intricate production process. I made each individual corn kernel out of clay, and aimed to convey a strong sense of realism in their shape and size. Upon completing the final structure, I unified the entire piece by painting it gold, which serves to act as a conceptual reflection of how fundamental food is to our lives. We, in the comfort of our Tesco-and-Sainsbury’s-laden first world environment, can purchase a plastic bag full of corn on a cob whenever we so desire. Yet for others, those who have never seen a Tesco in their lives, any form of food is something scarce, holy; golden.

Medium: Clay

Width: 30 Height: 10 Depth: 30

Keywords: Ai Weiwei, Corn on a cob, Gold, Third-World