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Summer Studio Residency Winners
Ibrahim Azab | Isaac Bokoko | Shauna Cribbin
During our Summer 2020 programme we were able to offer local, young artists a free studio space and specialist mentoring for 3 months on site at the Bomb Factory.
The artists were chosen from a considerable number of applications, and were awarded the opportunity based on financial hardship, creative ability and commitment to the work.
See their journeys below.
This opportunity was made possible by the Cripplegate Foundation.
IBRAHIM AZAB
London-based Artist and Curator Ibrahim Azab shifts between Sculpture, Performance and Photography. Ideas of process, perception, and information form the centre point of Azab’s practice whilst surrounding research of his work investigates the relationship between the subconscious and reality, material and immaterial within a hyper-consumer and visual culture. His work explores the photograph as object, through digital and physical intervention, with a focus towards the movement and transfer of visual language as abstract information. Significantly, the work of Ibrahim Azab is concerned with failure and representation within the photographic medium, playfully surfacing the act of seeing and unseeing through a phenomenological understanding of the surface.
Azab (b.1996) Studied BA Photography at The Arts University Bournemouth in 2017. After graduating, Azab worked at Peckham 24 (2018-2019) as curatorial assistant, alongside this Azab worked as a lighting technician at Big Sky Studios whilst developing his practice from home. In 2019 he left and worked as a freelance photographic and curatorial assistant having exhibited as part of Elephant Magazine Summer Exhibition. During 2019, Azab joined Revolv Collective where he has been involved in curating public workshops, seminars and exhibitions, supporting graduate and emerging artists.
In 2020 Azab was awarded with the Bomb Factory Summer Residency where he is still based. Since the summer residency, Azab has expanded and further developed his research and practice having produced a series of 10, 2.5 x 4.5’ perspex light boxes containing collages made on a mobile device during the lockdown period. During his time at the studio he has also curated a window exhibition at The Photographers’ Gallery titled ‘The Signal’ which was made up of works produced from a workshop he conducted with The Photographers’ Gallery Develop at Home programme for 16-25 year old photographers where the participants made digital collages from mobile devices. Azab also exhibited part of Fresh Cuts at Sid Motion Gallery and Performing Dawns at Hoxton Gallery and has also featured in Wallpaper* Magazine, Harrods Magazine, Artlicks, and Photoworks.
@ibby_azab
Image © Birgit Von Bally
ISAAC BOKOKO
Isaac Bokoko, also known as Kokes, is a 19-year-old aspiring Director of Photography and Filmmaker from Islington, North London. He is of Congolese, Guadelopeon and Welsh heritage, and sees himself as a visual artist creating, collaborating and captivating people with visual art.
Coming from the multicultural working-class hub, which is both Islington and London, Isaac has been surrounded by amazing stories and characters throughout his entire life, something he recognises as one of his motivations. He was first drawn to the visual arts to captivate these characters and stories.
Isaac has worked alongside and for various people, groups and production companies including Fully Focused Productions, Jamal Edwards (filmmaker and owner of SBTV), Wall of Comedy and Pretty Productions.
Recent works include 'Diamonds in the Dirt Part 1’, a documentary exploring the talents and skills of London's working-class youth, and ‘Coming Out Of Lockdown’, a short film he had the pleasure of being Director of Photography on, and documentation of the London Black Lives Matter March in June 2020.
As a whole, Isaac’s passion is filmmaking, and he hopes to continue doing what he loves: telling such stories and collaborating and working with all kinds of creatives both nationally and worldwide!
SHAUNA CRIBBIN
Shauna Cribbin is a British multidisciplinary Artist based in London, whose practice includes collage, print, sculpture, installation and sound. Navigating social class divisions and consequent systems of taste, Shauna employs the cultural signifiers of material, colour and image to speak of her own identity. Drawing from found imagery, advertisement, and memory she adopts a confrontational mode of visual representation. Infused with the culture of the night, club interiors and radical design, her work glamorises the mundane, elevating the everyday to celebratory heights. Bridging nostalgia with otherworldly aesthetics and futuristic modes of representation, her work elaborates on themes of escapism, aspiration and hope for working class women.
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My plan after art school was to make no art and work full time. The simplicity of the application process for the bomb residency made me want to do it, it didn’t feel forced, it was just show us your work and why you should have it. When I was given the opportunity in August within days I was given the keys to a studio and immediately everything that felt out of reach was there in front of me to get stuck into. I am very grateful to Pallas for giving me 3 months to realise and understand that I could make work and experiment freely within this new space. Having female mentors was refreshing and an invaluable part of the experience that I hadn’t had before. Both Anna Reading and Pallas helped me massively through critique, conversation and support with things like group show applications, statements and how to promote you and your work. I am continuing as a studio holder at Bomb and look forward to all that is to come.
