Like a timeline in abstract form, Amy Gadney combines fragments from her own notebooks, found materials and automatic drawing to create a sense of living in time.

Everywhere is a text and language, but there’s no definition or easy conclusion. As St Augustine said, ‘I know what time is, but if I am asked to explain it I can’t’.

Found plywood and scratched perspex are re-purposed and used in place of canvas. Faded ink, wrinkles, and water-damage on found paper embody the past. The obscure, precise nature of everything Gadney collects is made explicit in her art-making process.

Originally created for Chinese calligraphy, the snaking shape of the ‘Leporello’ pieces (concertina notebooks) resist both traditional framing and composition. By including a wide range of mark-making (reminders, doodles, automatic painting) the work shifts between ordered thinking and intuitive states. As a starting point, Gadney has picked out pages from one of her own old sketchbooks (as well a stranger’s notebook found in a skip).

The ‘Timeline’ pieces are made from cut-up plywood found on the street, fragments from her old notebooks and Iron Gall ink (the oldest known ink recipe). For the two ‘Palimpsest’ shelf installations, Gadney has taken her studio walls as inspiration, and used her past work, memos and found materials and painting.

Gadney draws from a wide range of influences from Abstract Expressionism, Chinese philosophy, and clown performance. By bringing together her creative practice and choice of materials with the viewer, Gadney conjures up a new, protean sense being-in-our-world.