her older work would have provided a better escape than her newer work

cite: Bibliography

Dexter, Emma. "Phyllida Barlow's Work has a Spine-Tingling Force." Apollo, 05, 2017, 54, http://ccl.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/magazines/phyllida-barlows-work-has-spine-tingling-force/docview/1889988769/se-2.

Phyllida's art is an escape (walking through it-- never dreary, colorful, Alice in wonderland-y)

her newer work

why interactive art is good for mental health

taking the mundane and adding color/interactive aspects

"Throughout her career, Barlow has used cheap, readily available materials, such as timber, concrete and fabric to make sculpture, exploring in the process the limits of what is possible with those materials, and often using them to create colossal and immersive sculptural ensembles." cite: Emma Dexter, “Phyllida Barlow’s work has a spine-tingling force” Apollo Magazine, May 9, 2017, https://www.apollo-magazine.com/phyllida-barlows-work-has-a-spine-tingling-force/.

her work is very free-flowing: "Phyllida's working process is one of continual revision and reassessment, as ideas coalesce and then morph into something else. Some elements that seemed quite fixed and determined disappeared, or reappeared later on in another guise! Right up until the last weeks, Phyllida was revising and reshaping her plans. Indeed that process continued during the installation in the Pavilion when certain decisions and adaptations were made in the moment, in situ."

the work's effect on people "Phyllida's work often has a spine-tingling force: here, it has a dramatic effect on the body when you're in the space with it. As I explored the show, I felt like Alice in Wonderland wandering around in a strange and curious environment."

cite: Bibliography

"Her large-scale sculptures are made out of low-tech materials such as rubber, tarpaulin, polythene, bitumen, concrete, paint, rags and plaster. Once shown, the exhibits are dismantled and re-used."

MUNDANE: Bibliography

Chapman, Peter. "Going Out: Art Phyllida Barlow: `peninsula': [Final Edition]." The Independent, Nov 20, 2004. http://ccl.idm.oclc.org/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/newspapers/going-out-art-phyllida-barlow-peninsula/docview/310758334/se-2.

"Barlow‘s works pose a constant challenge; they conquer the space as if they led a life of their own. They invite viewers to reconsidering spaces, perceive volume, and hear the language of architecture."

Haus der Kunst. “Phyllida Barlow. Frontier.” Accessed November 17, 2022. https://www.hausderkunst.de/en/exhibitions/phyllida-barlow.

"A testament to Barlow’s lifelong dedication to exploring the formal and material possibilities of sculpture across multiple media, the exhibition foregrounds the manner in which her work continues to question sculpture’s relationship to the structures of objects as they exist in the world."

"as she drew the works onto the plans of the Gallery and talking of what she was drawing--one enormous structure that engulfs the staircase, and seems to have spilled its guts down the stairs and into the lower gallery and even the cafe and bookshop -- she seemed to take possession of the building, altering my own understanding of it as I imagined it transformed. and then the works themselves come, in her words, 'elbowing their way' into the Gallery, filling it with their insistently material. presence, making new senes of it as they take up residence" (Fiona Bradley, Phyllida Barlow: Sculpture, 1963-2015 (Edinburgh: The Fruitmarket Gallery, 2015), 11-21.)

"yet there is nothing other-worldly about it: it is very much of the here and now, engaging with the world as it is, with associations both positive and much less so...wreck and ruin; of triumph and disaster both natural and man-made; of things happening right now or just last week but also things which may either have happened a long time ago or which have yet even to happen" ((Fiona Bradley, Phyllida Barlow: Sculpture, 1963-2015 (Edinburgh: The Fruitmarket Gallery, 2015), 11-21.)

"Likewise, Cuypers and colleagues
(2012) show that there is an association between taking part in cultural activities such as going to museums and higher satisfaction in life" (aesthetic experience)

"The artist’s new ‘lockdown’ sculptures in Zurich continue a shift away from the more immersive environments within her practice. Created in her home studio in London, these smaller sculptures, placed on steel plinths or directly onto the wall, invite the viewer to consider the works on an individual and more intimate basis. Working on a smaller scale during this period has also allowed the artist to return to a more direct means of making". (“Phyllida Barlow small worlds,” Hauser & Wirth, accessed November 18, 2022, https://www.hauserwirth.com/hauser-wirth-exhibitions/32037-phyllida-barlow-small-worlds/.)

phyllida background

born in Newcastle, England in 1944. She attended Chelsea College of Art and Slade School of Fine Art. Throughout her life, she has notably received the Aachen Art Prize, she was named a Royal Academician, she's been able to show her art at the Royal Academy of the Arts, London, England, and other impressive locations.

Quintessential Barlow artworks are ginormous (typically floor to ceiling) structures with a mix of more ordinary materials such as cardboard and plaster with bright paint and materials throughout. "the artist leaves exposed, unfinished seams, revealing the means of the works’ making and playing with the tensions between hardness and softness, the imperious and the comic, and the painterly and the sculptural." “Phyllida Barlow in "London"” Art21, Accessed November 18, 2022, https://art21.org/watch/art-in-the-twenty-first-century/s10/phyllida-barlow-in-london-segment/.

covid on mental health

"COVID-19 has sparked or amplified much more serious mental health problems. A great number of people have reported psychological distress and symptoms of depression, anxiety or post-traumatic stress. And there have been worrying signs of more widespread suicidal thoughts and behaviours, including among health care workers."

“The impact of COVID-19 on mental health cannot be made light of” Who.int, last modified, June 16, 2022, https://www.who.int/news-room/feature-stories/detail/the-impact-of-covid-19-on-mental-health-cannot-be-made-light-of

"This shows that participants in the non-interactive condition experienced negative emotions more intensely than those in the interactive condition. And in contrast, participants in the interactive condition performed signiﬁcantly higher in the amusement factor (which includes humour and joy subscales) than people in the non-interactive condition, ... indicating that people had more fun in the interactive condition."

“Aesthetic Experience and Creativity in Interactive Art,” Art & Perception, Research Gate, last modified May 2021, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/351900629_Aesthetic_Experience_and_Creativity_in_Interactive_Art.