‘Inanimate objects, household containers, pets, bunches of flowers. Whether the items I paint or make are used for their purpose or taken out of context, they are all linked to me, through memory and history or constant use they are a part of my life and as such I record them as evidence of myself.’

Stuff of Life Container and Tulips With Pattern (50x50 oil on canvas), is part of a wider body of work in which Megan has been investigating how much of the self needs to be visible or present in a self portrait.

Megan’s work includes receptacles or vessels she has manufactured, out of geometric shapes of card taped together. The craftsmanship involved in making the vases and bowls is a hangover from her work in education making props for plays and the objects made in the studio are as much about this extension of skills as her enjoyment of the forms she creates. The body of work surrounding this is a mixed collection of different sized canvases utilising patterns found in Megan’s life to highlight and compliment the component that is the main focus in each canvas. For example, Elements of Me (60x90cm oil on canvas) uses a washing liquid bottle as a form to hold flowers, taking the white plastic bottle out of context, resting it against a split background of part feathers (as a memory of a recent holiday), part plain mustard coloured backdrop and leaving the object un-grounded creating an unobserved tension in the painting. This work sits alongside a large open edged bowl decorated in red with a basic image of tomatoes collages (cut from many tins of chopped tomatoes) into the inner surface, whilst the outer still shows the triangles used to create the form. This bowl whilst achieving a near perfect circular form from above, shows it’s handmade credentials when viewed from any other angles.

Working in her studio building still life set ups on a table then photographing them as a stable way to recreate specific lighting and a point in time (especially for flowers) The marks Megan makes the ‘Touch’ left by her as more proof she is present in her work, while trying to distance further the self portrait from the physical manifestation of a recreated likeness.