Bio
Hello. I'm Topaz Pauls. I am an artist, life model, life drawing coordinator, art teacher and sometime performance artist. I am a daily cook, regular cloud-gazer and frequent piano noodler. I'm based in Edinburgh, from York. I am half German, with a Steiner background. I have an acute academic and anecdotal interest in synaesthesia and ASMR.
Statement
I am beguiled by the face, I am entranced by shape, I respond to a presence. I wish to capture that elusive ambiguity that asks more questions of the viewer than it answers. I am led by a sensitivity to form and an appreciation of the character and quality of the materials I use. My figurative artworks are more than an individual's portrait; they aspire to be a symbol of human feelingness and our capacity to empathise as we behold the being looking back at us. In my imagined colour-cloud worlds, I play with the deliciousness of paint to create suggested landscapes which glow from within. In both, I wish to explore ambiguity; that which is given, and that which is withheld, to always create a dialogue between artwork and viewer.
Selected CV
Edinburgh University: Linguistics and English Language, MA (Hons) (2014)
Leith School of Art Figurative Course (2015)
Beyond The Figure, Dundas St Gallery (December 2015)
Naked Aye Art, St Margaret's House (October 2015)
Leith School of Art Summer Exhibition (July 2015)
Naked Aye Art, St Margaret's House (April 2015)
Leith School of Art Christmas Exhibition (December 2014)
Edinburgh University Student Association Student Artwork Exhibition, Teviot, (May 2013)