Handle with Care // Esmae Dougherty-Price

About

Love makes itself known in a variety of relationships. We are often overly focused on the importance of a romantic love, saying that it is the beacon that guides our relationships. However, this isn’t the only facet that the emotion of love can result in. The Greeks conceptualised love as an emotion that has many facets that are rooted in experience. These reveal much about how human nature can express emotions in varied ways. 

Based on the artist's reflection on her own relationships during her time undertaking psychodynamic therapy, the work focuses on different types of love, including tough love, the passionate, desire and longing to be loved, familial, unconditional love and self-love. 

Baring her own vulnerabilities, the artist seeks to explore her outlook and understanding of these emotional states of love…

Esmae Dougherty-Price is a predominantly crafts-based artist. Using ceramics and the employment of mediums such as textiles to recognise the debates surrounding craft’s relationship to contemporary art, the medium’s marginality and using it to emphasise craft’s potential for liberating self- expression. The incorporation of these mediums and processes within her practice, often identified as ‘women’s work’ allows Dougherty-Price to explore her curiosity surrounding gender and the body,  whilst also presenting unique views of contemporary society through art to a wider audience. Other themes found in the work include the domestic space, the uncanny, modern-fairy tales, bodily functions and gender-based violence.