Beauty and the Grotesque: Introducing The Painting of Emilia Symis

Written by Oliver Squirrell

Fine Art Degree Shows are often curious affairs. A manikin, a pile of bricks and a multimedia magic mushroom trip lay in wait, requiring us to consume a lengthy dossier before we can dip our toe in, let alone submerge. Whilst works of this nature are an undeniable part of the landscape, the abstract conceptual has become a kind of curious cancer, consuming the vessel as a whole at the expense of other medium and a form of immediacy that I feel is a crucial component of compelling work.

Every now and again however, an artist boldly raises their head above the parapet and hits you between the eyes with something wildly different to the new norm. Enter my 2019 visit to NUA and the painting work of Emilia Symis: Painting that depicts unusual yet familiar subject matter, painting with stunning energy and vibrancy, painting that demonstrates technical ability, painting with its own scent?!

We recently caught up with Emilia to discover the story of how her distinctive practice emerged, how she has developed her work further since graduating and what the future holds in store.

OS: Hi Emilia, thank you for taking the time to chat with us. The first thing I’m dying to find out is how the idea of using food to explore the relationship between beauty and the grotesque first transpired and developed?

ES: I started to use food to explore this relationship when I discovered the artist, Maisie Cousins, at the start of my second year at University. I took inspiration from her photos and used fruit and flowers in my own photography. I then extended the type of food I used in my photos in my third year and post graduation; delving into junk food, childhood snacks and weird and wonderful 70s dishes. I found using food was a good tool to capture ‘beauty and the grotesque’ because we’re all familiar with how things taste and by looking at a realistic painting of food, you can imagine and almost taste the image. This can then be easily manipulated if something repulsive is added into the equation, e.g strange food combinations or a razor blade. This can change a seemingly beautiful, delicious image into one of disgust and apprehension.

Emilia Symis, “Lickety-Split Part 2”, 2020

The phenomena of ‘Food Porn’ has also taken over social media in the last decade and I think we find enormous pleasure in looking at yummy pictures of food, so I enjoy playing with this concept. Furthermore, because we all know how food looks and tastes, my art is therefore universal to everyone, even kids. I think it’s important to not exclude people from modern art; it can be intimidating if you're not familiar with the art world.

OS: Your aim is to make the viewer feel uncomfortable or confused when they observe your art, where did this desire come from and could you share some examples of how people have reacted so far?

ES: This goal started in my final year of A Levels. I created a series of large, bold paintings of eyes that were heavily adorned with makeup, glitter and foreign substances that shouldn’t be near something as delicate as an eye. Again, combining beauty with the grotesque. I continued to explore this relationship throughout my degree. In my third year, I was involved in an exhibition called ‘Wall-to-Wall’, where we were assigned an entire wall to create a piece of work onto. Over the course of two weeks, I painted an image of a peeled ruby grapefruit and the flesh had been sliced, to create the illusion of a real wound. I’m used to painting in private, but because I was creating this piece in a corridor with people passing by, they would often stop and try and guess what it was as I was painting. Some people said it looked like an autumn leaf or the jam inside a cake, but it wasn’t until it was nearly finished when people realised what it resembled and suddenly felt uncomfortable by the 3 metre long slit in the wall.

I also created a diptych in my third year, called ‘Nostalgia’. These paintings depict two very strange food combinations: shrimps and bananas, and eggs and cherries. To help the viewer figure out these references, I varnished the paintings with a layer of artificially sweet fragrance oils, banana and cherry. Some people were able to link the two, and recognise that the subject matter resembled the real life food combinations found in confectionary - foamy shrimps and bananas and fried eggs and cherries in Haribo. I wanted to make people realise how strange these food combinations are and imagine what it would be like to eat them together. Others felt that the sickly sweet scent combined with the subject matter made the overall experience even more nauseating and confusing.

OS: I love the fact that you incorporate scent into your paintings, do you have any plans to expand this or incorporate other senses into future works?

ES: I now only use scent to accompany my work when they are in an exhibition. I’ve found it works better when the scent is separate to the paintings because then you can easily change it and also no one wants to buy smelly art! I enjoy seeing how the exhibition shifts from a purely visual experience, to being immersive, interactive and multi-sensory. Because olfactory art is a fairy new, unexplored concept, I have had to carry out my own experiments to figure out the best ways of achieving ‘smelly art’, which can be very challenging. I have had wonderful responses from exhibitions where I’ve used smell, especially from my solo show at The Corn Hall - ‘A Feast for the Senses’. I found that the children really engaged with it and enjoyed guessing the scents that I’d disguised within tin cans under glass cloches. I would love to continue using scent in future exhibitions but I’m also intrigued to see how other senses could impact my work. Perhaps including objects/surfaces that the viewer can touch would be interesting, or having actual food that the viewer can taste while they look at the art. There is a lot of potential to manipulate the senses in order to view the art differently.

OS: You're a graduate of NUA, one of my favourite Arts Universities, in your experience what value does Fine Art Education currently have, and would you say the financial and time costs are worth it?

ES: I have always wanted a creative career, but I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do. I decided to do a Fine Art degree at NUA because you have an incredible amount of freedom to experiment and discover new disciplines and equipment that you may not have had the opportunity to use before. In year 0 and year 1, you’re able to try new art forms and discover what works for you, and as the degree progresses, you gradually refine your practise. The degree definitely helped me to discover my style and what I want my career to be - a full time artist. It wasn’t until my final year at NUA when I realised the possibilities of being just that and selling my work to make a living. It was always a dream of mine but I didn’t think it was a realistic career option until then. In this sense I think Fine Art education is very important because it helps budding artists to figure out how they can use their creativity in their own practise and also in a career. Unfortunately, there seems to be a lot of negatively towards creative degrees from some generations, I can’t tell you the amount of times I’ve heard ‘what jobs can you get with a degree like that?’ or ‘so you’re going to be an art teacher then?’ or ‘you’re paying all that money to just draw and paint?’, which of course is silly. But to me, my degree has been an invaluable life experience and I’m now on the path to where I want to be. My thought has always been, do what you love and if you’re passionate and determined then you will succeed and be happy.

Emilia at her degree show, next to “The Aftermath”, 2019

OS: You have been very successful at securing exhibitions both during and post University, how have you achieved this?

ES: I found that my degree show was an excellent way to get noticed by other artists, curators and industry professionals. I was very fortunate to have a number of exhibition invites off the back of this show, which has led me to secure exhibitions in London, Suffolk and Norfolk. While I was at uni, my tutors and fellow artists were able to tell me about various exhibition opencalls and living in a creative city meant that there was plenty of opportunities at my fingertips. However, I was worried that this would come to a halt when I finished uni and moved back home to Stowmarket, although I was determined to keep the ball rolling! I find one of the most successful ways of getting into exhibitions, or at least having your work seen by professionals, is by applying to competitions and open-calls. There are some brilliant sites out there like artrabbit.com and callforentries.com that give you lists of opportunities, all you have to do is cherry pick the ones that you think you’ve got the best chance at. Although I’ve learnt to grow thick skin and prepare for rejection!

Emilia Symia, “Buddy the Elf's Spaghetti Recipe”, 2019

OS: How has your practice been affected by Covid-19?

ES: My life as an artist isn’t too dissimilar to my life during lockdown. I often spend half my time in my studio taking photos and painting anyway. However, I rely on places like charity shops to find props for my photos, so some of the ideas I’ve had for paintings have had to be put on hold. Also of course exhibitions have been postponed, which is lucky as I’m sure many have been cancelled entirely. I may have lost out on sales from exhibitions, but I have been able to promote my work and my shop on social media and I have fortunately gained sales and commissions that way. Lockdown has given me a rare chance to spend as much time as I like creating, and I’ve therefore been able to produce a lot of paintings and ideas for future projects when lockdown is over.

OS: What is the longer-term ambition for your practice?

ES: Eventually, I would love to be self-sufficient from my art. At the moment I have to work part-time as well because I cannot currently live off the income I make from just selling my art. But I’m hoping that if I keep a good momentum going, then things will take off soon. I want to keep pushing my subject matter and my concepts, to see the extent to which food can be used to portray beauty and disgust. But I also want to broaden my abilities and perhaps add elements of portraiture to my paintings and explore new subject matter. Another dream would be to one day collaborate with brands, food stylists and artists that have inspired me, like Jen Monroe and Maisie Cousins.