Meet Harmanpreet Randhawa!
Harman is an artist based in Oxford and Coventry whose transdisciplinary practice involves making installations, sculptures and performances from found materials. Longing, belonging and desire surround Harman’s practice, their work oscillating between the sensual and the domestic, rethinking boundaries of homely spaces, human bodies and nature. Below, Harman tells us a bit more about their time at Modern Art Oxford.
Can you tell us about what you are working on during your Residency?
Working as an artist outside of an art school has always seemed both daunting and exciting. This residency at Modern Art Oxford has allowed me to explore what artmaking outside of the art school can look like for me through critical introspection of the key themes in my work.
Has your practice changed in any way during your time at Modern Art Oxford, or how do you think you practise might develop?
The changes in the pace at which I make new work or the different materials, my research and working methodologies now feel even more interested in the notions of change, transition, and longing.
How are you approaching collaboration with other artists, community members or organisations during your residencies?
So far, I have been addressing the above concerns by looking back at my photo/material archives and undertaking experiments in collage-making and performance art to realise different approaches to making new work, whilst also venturing into socially engaged making through upcoming workshops with my collaborator, friend and 2023 Platform Graduate Award Nominee, Sarah Catterall.
Throughout their residency, Harman has performed DJ sets in our galleries, organised the Moments workshops with our Platform Graduate Artists and is running a series of research-sharing talks: Open Doors and Closed Windows.
Find Harman next in the gallery at our MAO Late on 19 October where they will present Open Doors and Closed Windows: The Void and the Fire. You can also take part in Unfolding Moments, a workshop created by Harman and the Platform Graduate Award artists. On Thursday 26 October, Harman will be hosting a collage making workshop in the galleries at 2pm.