Having spent many hours submersed in a baby pool in her backyard to get the perfect shot, Sydney-based artist Danielle Wright can confirm that a large and meaningful portion of her digital art practice is defined by its intense physicality. Her camera remote wrapped in plastic and her fingers pruned beyond recognition, she repeatedly took self-portraits until she was satisfied with the images that would become the base of a complex digital composition.
Wright always begins with her own photographs, whether of herself, of her work in other mediums such as paint and ink or of the landscape she experiences on the long walks she loves so much. This intense physical connection to a medium that is often considered to be largely cerebral is what gives Wright’s works their depth and emotive power. Even during the digital process, the artist intersperses her work with activities that bolster her sense of embodiment, such as meditation, drumming, music and movement.
Finally, her last touches to each piece bind the physical to the digital using thread, with the artist weaving thin strands into her surfaces, leaving echoes of gesture within the ink. “Time, effort and spiritual connection make the artwork personal,” says the artist, who strives to establish that connection by pouring herself into each pixel.
Above: Danielle Wright, The Threshold, 2023. Digital photographic art, 52 x 52cm. Courtesy: the artist.
