Artist Focus :: Frances Priest

Priest is a pattern obsessive and lover of colour, making work that explores cultural histories and narratives associated with ornamental motifs and patterns.

Trained in ceramics at Edinburgh College of Art, over the past 20 years she has developed a studio ceramic practice with work acquired by private collectors internationally and UK public collections. She has expanded this practice into large-scale ceramic tile works, developing commissions for private clients and projects in the public realm. 

Imbrication is a generative digital animation created in collaboration with digital artist Sam Healy. Co-commissioned by New Media Scotland’s Alt-w fund and Aberdeen performing arts with support from Creative Scotland. The work was originally presented on a four and half meter high screen at Music Hall Aberdeen. Motifs from the realm of neoclassical architecture dance and evolve, tracing a journey from the ancient, analogue and physical, to the modern, digital and abstract. 

For the SSA 130 Years | Annual Exhibition, the work is presented as a projection on the floor of the Royal Scottish Academy, accompanied by two new ceramic works made in response to stills from the animation. The work sits in dialogue with the architecture of the Royal Scottish Academy, designed and built by William Henry Playfair in 1826. The architectural motifs are unpinned, on the move, and referring back to their original forms in Greek and Roman polychromatic architecture.