Gemma Pardo (1976, Gallicia)

Gemma Pardo is a Spanish video artist and film maker currently living and working in London. She graduated with a MA in Fine Art from Byam Shaw School of Art, University of the Arts in London in 2007, after completing her BA Hons in Fine Art, at the London College of Communication and Fine Art at Central Saint Martins in 2005. She also completed a PGCE in Art & Design at Goldsmiths. Her video Congo 1880 was selected for the Bloomberg New Contemporaries in 2007. Between 2011 and 2013, she was a lecturer in Creative Media at Richmond upon Thames College.

Water and the sea are central elements in Pardo’s Video Painting and, more generally, in her artistic exploration. The Around the Shore series presents serene and placid scenarios characterized by the absence of any narrative. Only a soft breeze at times animates the scene, steadily and gently changing the still landscape of these digital paintings.

Selected exhibitions and projects include From the Sea To You, Poca Gallery, Vizcaya, Spain (2014), Sen limites, Hanmi Gallery, London (2014), Recreation, Salon Flux, London (2013), Open Gallery exhibition, Shoreditch Town Hall, London (2011), Save Our Placards, Museum of London (2011), Glynn Vivian Gallery, Swansea, UK (2011), Engaging the False Mirror, Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, USA (2010), Can Art save us?, Millennium Gallery, Sheffield (2010), Latent Talent, Santa Monica, Barcelona (2010), Finisterre, Ferens Art Gallery, Hull, UK (2009), Grounds for Progress, Hessel Museum, New York (2008), Bloomberg New Contemporaries 2007, Rochelle School & Club Row, London (2007), Video Cuts, Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow (2007).

“Video Painting is a medium that has become increasingly dominant within my practice, allowing me to expand the ongoing theme of water and to explore its dynamic presence in natural and urban landscapes. The alteration of these landscapes, sometimes as a part of a natural cycle and other times due to human intervention, presents the viewer with a contrast between stillness and transformation. I will capture images that allow the viewer to immerse him/herself within the scene; a point where land and water meet.” Gemma Pardo