Looking at me, looking at you Painting

Just completed an MA in Fine art at Middlesex University. Graduated from Central Saint Martin's in 2010. My artistic practice starts with garish photographs of friends, family and found imagery that I have had some encounter with. These images are often of poor quality and I use them as a basis for my paintings. I am interested in the tension between the "˜mundane' and "˜everyday' imagery in contrast to the alluring imagery of commercial culture. Be it of a burlesque dancer or a footballer, these paintings comment on self-assurance and vulnerability- painted with attitude. Recently, I have started collecting photographs of young fashion victims. I have found hanging around Madrid and London. From these images I have started to depict a contemporary context with reference to the paintings of Toulouse-Lautrec's Paris nightlife. Dapper man about Hoxton 2011, the man depicted wearing a pink tutu the elements of clothing also linking it what the women of the Moulin Rouge would have worn. In contrast I have began to create two paintings together that reference Bridget Riley's black and white optical paintings from the 1960s, the contemporary painter Andrew Greaves (who gave a seminar about his paintings and his particular reference to Riley in one of his paintings.) I wanted to exhaust the idea of using and reusing Bridget Riley's optical painting technique from the 60s. Into a current culture transforming both of their ideas into my own painting, commenting about recycling and referencing existing ideas. My own technique and painting style also reference's John Bratby and Dawn Mellor's in the way I "˜grotesquely' use a raw style melding paint on to the canvas. On the other hand my work is in stark contrast to Bratby's misanthropy because it is my love of people and their own unique and complex existence that compels me.