Octavia Milner

Octavia Milner paints abstract landscapes and assembles sculptures from found materials that she picks up on walks. The works in this exhibition come from an instinctive response to the recent loss of her husband. Many of her familiar themes appear — rocks, water, decaying structures — alongside a sense of things continuing and being recycled. The transient nature of all things.

Since moving to Devon, Octavia has begun making new sculptures using charred wood from the remains of fires on the beach, and washed-up broken parts from wooden structures. To these she adds damaged, fragile pieces of cardboard and found objects from her collection, transforming the unwanted and the broken into sculptures with a strong, new presence, challenging the viewer to see the value and history in what was once considered useless.

Also shown here for the first time are ambiguous plaster forms, suggestive of the body, marking a new direction in her sculpture.

The portraits on show convey the secret or hidden self, expressing things that cannot be put into words, while the landscape paintings also contain unseen layers.

Octavia originally trained as a textile designer and later as a speech and language therapist before working full time as an artist. She recently moved from London to Devon, where she continues her art practice.