Female Voices in Art: Miriam Escofet, Artist

Miriam Escofet (b. 1967, Barcelona, Spain) is an award winning artist. Originally graduating in 3D Design from Brighton School of Art, she turned to painting soon after and has exhibited widely and internationally, including many solo exhibitions. Her work has evolved over the years through many genres including still life, architecture, allegory and imaginary composition, eventually arriving at portraiture. She is known for her exacting technique and attention to detail. She lives in London and has regularly been selected for the BP Portrait Award exhibition and for The Royal Society of Portrait Painters annual exhibitions. She was awarded the Burke’s Peerage Foundation Prize for Classically Inspired Portraiture in 2015 and the First Prize at the BP Portrait Award 2018, widely considered to be the most globally prestigious portrait competition.

Could you tell us something about your role in the art world?

I see my role as that of an artist and maker who wants to create works that are intimate, honest and beautiful, that will hopefully move and inspire an audience. When I stand in front of an artwork that speaks to me, I feel connected to everything that is magical, mysterious and human in the Universe. This could be described as being akin to a spiritual experience or a moment of enlightenment. Art can shine a light on aspects of our inner lives and psyche that find little expression in our day to day lives and by this process of inner illumination makes us feel connected in some timeless way to the whole of humanity. This is why art moves us emotionally. I think this is an incredibly important function, especially in a world that often encourages competition, fragmentation and isolation. I want to be part of this mysterious process of communication and expression, that is why I am an artist.

What did you enjoy about being a part of this project?

I very much like the idea of celebrating female artists and I find Carla’s photographs beautiful and mysterious. Her work is clearly very classically inspired with a baroque sense of drama and light, these are qualities that I also feel are very much part of my work. I thought it would be really exciting to collaborate with someone whose vision and sense of aesthetic feel so akin to mine.

Do you have a favourite artist?

I always tend to look to the old masters for inspiration: for their purity of vision, for ideas on composition, for beauty and as examples of superlative painting technique.

My favourite artists, for all these reasons, are Jan van Eyck, Leonardo da Vinci, Holbein, Anthony Van Dyck, Rembrandt and Velazquez. Of course there are many others too, including sculptors, makers, photographers, designers and architects. I think different disciplines feed into each other.

There are also many contemporary artists who I admire too, but looking back at the Masters is like re-familiarizing myself again with the root DNA of art.

What is your earliest memory involving art?

I was lucky to grow up in an artistic household, my mother went to art school and my father is an artist. My earliest memories are of watching him draw, which seemed like a magic to my child’s eye. I would also spend hours looking through his many art books and our home was decorated with many artefacts, including old church statues, Saints and Madonnas they had collected over the years. These sacred objects and the energy they emanated were my first experience of the power and magic of art and the magnetism of objects. And of course the streets and architecture of Barcelona, where I grew up, left a huge impact on me too.

Do you have any special thoughts about the position of women in the art world?

I think women are really finding their moment in art now and it is wonderful to see. There are so many great and bold female artists in many disciplines and it is changing the narrative and subject matter of art. I don’t normally pay much heed to gender when I am looking at art, but if I think about it many of the images that have excited me lately are produced by female artists.

I think women are particularly well suited to artistic expression, as we tend to integrate intuition and emotional responses far more readily into our intellectual thought processes, which I think is very much how the creative flow works, where decisions feel almost organic.

What are you wearing, and is there a story behind it?

I often wear black and deep colours, I feel comfortable in dark colours and I am not a flamboyant dresser, but I do like the quiet drama of detail. I am holding some objects which are part of my extensive collection of props. I have been collecting many miscellaneous things to include in my paintings over many years, from nice artefacts to plastic toys, and some of these items have become particularly significant for me. I often construct maquettes and dioramas for my paintings and I also cast and modify some of the objects I have. The Chalice is an example of an object I have used several times in my paintings, it is a Georgian bronze urn, which I find very beautiful. The Goat’s skull is part of a collection of animal skulls for some Vanitas themed works.

What impact has the current health crisis on your daily practice?

I am very lucky, considering our current state of lock down, to have my studio at home, so access to my creative space has not been interrupted. I feel very blessed, as I know this is not the case for all artists, many of who share spaces.

I have also been lucky in that this crisis has coincided with a very busy period of work for me, where I have a few commissions on the go. So I have in fact been working incredibly hard during lock down.

But everything has been overcast with a cloud of uncertainty of course, which feels very unsettling. Inevitably many events have been cancelled, most sadly exhibitions which were due to open during this period, where I was showing some of my works. For example, my work ‘An Angel at my Table’ which won the BP Portrait Award 2018 was due to join an international touring exhibition, which has now been cancelled.

My biggest regret is that a very big and important commission which I have been working on since last summer, will miss out on a planned unveiling at The National Portrait Gallery, due to their planned closure for refurbishment of the Gallery at the end of June and museums not being able to open until July here in the UK

I also of course miss my regular trips to museums and galleries, which really inspire me and refresh me.

Is it changing your views on Art?

I think in our current state of strange detachment from our habitual world, art feels more important and relevant than ever. Isolation is leading to a lot of introspection in people, which I think is a good thing and is something we artists do every day of course.

Art speaks to our psyche, as well as our intellect, and people are more receptive to it than ever I find. It is not often we as a society are given the time to just ‘be’ and contemplate the meaning of life!

That’s one positive outcome for art from this crisis, but there is of course a huge worry about the future of museums and galleries, which are so intricately linked to artist’s survival and support structures, as well as being a resource for ideas and inspiration.

I also worry about the idea of most people experiencing art in digital form only, which can never be the same as seeing art in real life. If your only experience of a Rembrandt were through digital images, you would have no conception of the luminosity of his work or the sumptuousness of his paint layers. The digital platform is brilliant and a great tool, but it can never replace the real thing, nor should it.

Are you creating new initiatives and ways of working?

As I have been so busy working on existing projects, I have not had the mental space or need to explore new ways of working, it’s been a case of pushing on with the work on the easel every day.

I have plenty of ideas for new works, images keep coming into my mind, mainly drawing based. But this is not as a response to the current crisis, but rather a continuation of my work flow.

I suspect that despite what I have said above, the digital arena for presenting art will expand exponentially. And in fact I am currently having to think through how best to present the digital unveiling of my current commission. So yes, in terms of bringing the work out into the world, I am having to find new ways!