In her new work Ellen Bell shows how language distils the potentially overwhelming chaos of existence into something contained and organised. Her text garment forms are static – life, energy and experience are literally embodied in the words that describe them.
However, in Spelling Tests (2) 2005, she examines the way in which a child’s initial encounter with language seems to be little more than a process of ingestion, digestion and regurgitation, rather than understanding. In these pieces, tiny cuttings of text form the skeletal body of miniature child’s dresses. By ‘cutting up’ texts, such as letters, as in Letters Home 2005, into little paper buttons, Bell makes the script indistinct and arcane. Sewing the texts back together is a way of reassembling the allegorical nature of language rather than reproducing its literal understanding.