Emily Speed

A small family holiday last week in Conwy, obviously including Plas Mawr, which is in my top 10 houses and probably where the plaster love comes from. Can't really work with plaster in my studio as there's no ventilation/carpet/clean sister etc but it is nearly garden studio time and looking forward to getting back to the scagliola experiments 😁 I do wonder if he was pleased with how the workmen interpreted the caryatids in the great hall, I always find them more like mermaids.

Bits. 1. Drawing made at ECA, 2023, maybe a plan for a larger sculpture - thinking about Madonna della Misericordia (Madonna of the sheltering cloak) and what a matriarchal art school might look like. I ran out of time on this fellowship and need to pick these ideas up again at some point! 2. Drawing made at ECA, 2023. 3. A lockdown drawing, possibly 2021?! - walled garden. 4. Etruscan bowls drawn in Villa Guilia, 2014 5. A1 Photocopies of Italian domes and me in polaroids taken by Dan, 2012. @anneka.french wrote a lovely text about this work in Photomonitor in 2014, it's on Anneka's wordpress now. 6. A wall from Body/Builders at @exeterphoenixgallery in 2013 maybe. Felt tips and pencil crayon on paper, some digitally printed and sewn into a banner, a last minute curtain pole from Clas Olsen (salutes) in a dash by a curator who gets involved, @mattburrows3 :D Tracing themes through past work and doing lots of drawing, so trying to work out the point when it got uptight ;D maybe it always was.

In November I went to see @cathiepilkington incredible work (1-3) at @freudmuseum and it was a total joy. So many layers in it. The next day I took @georgina__starr equally layered and brilliant book 'The Discreet Dash' (4) from @publishingjoan , to Venice and it turns out it split neatly in half so I read half on the way and finished it on the way back. Parts of the book are set just off Finchley Road, so the book was like a bridge on a dreamy journey away from Cathie's work, through watery Venice and into some unknowable houses like Palazzo Fortuny (5-7), ending at the closing ceremony for Tolia Astakhishvili's @toliaasta amazing 'To Love and Devour' (8,9) @nicolettafioruccifoundation . I saw cocoons everywhere and was spit out abruptly at the end and then straight back to work. Nice to float away for a little while.

Emily Speed @woolwichcontemporaryprintfair Soft Touch, Limited edition of 11, plaster cast from plate litho. Come and see it at Woolwich Print Fair, or DM us to secure your unique copy. (£420)

I thought I’d share a few progress images from The Wormery, a flexible seating space commissioned by @at.the.library_ for the children’s library area in Bootle Library. No photos of me because I am the art equivalent of the mum who takes all the pics 😉 I was so happy to work with Matt @plaey_workshop again to make a new seating area after the children’s library needed to relocate within the building. I designed something that could move and be reconfigured as a looooooong seat or make a small story circle, or a kind of stage. Matt and I got to play with Jesmonite for the worm inlays, and he did immaculate work - as always- making the Wormery. This builds on Possibilities Club, an 18-month project I did from 2017-18 with children from the area and which ended in a refurb for the kids library and a still much-loved play structure realised by @plaey_workshop Worms were the inspo because they agitate, dig deep, collaborate and create places for new growth, so they seemed the perfect inspiration for this space of discovery and learning. Like children, and hopefully artists too, worms can improve the spaces around them, and they are also wriggly. A real wormery is being made for the garden at Bootle Library (such a great resource!) so will be occasionally wheeled in to the kids wormery :)  Produced by the brilliant @linnyvenables   Commissioned by @at.the.library_  an NPO partnership between  @seftonlibraries  and @rule_of_threes  thank you Lesley and @msbrewster for the total trust.  Upholstery of sofa (not pictured because it’s always being used by loads of families, as it should be ❤️) by Imogen Woodings @bluebird_upholstery  other less finessed sewing by me.  Materials that Plaey used were supplied by @lathamsltd and the workers was made from @garnicaplywood  plywood @valchromat_official  and @himacseurope with some @jesmonite_ltd  inlays. #childrenslibrary #library #commission #storagesolutions #books #play #structure #learning #collaborate #create #seating #storage #plywood #valchromat #jesmonite #simple #playful #modular #emilyspeed #plaey

We have been delighted to work with @espeedina over this last year developing a new body of work in response to the body and it's relationship with architecture. The idea of shelter and the inhabitant is at the core of much of Emily's work; how a person is shaped by the buildings they have occupied and how a person occupies their own psychological space. Tomorrow we will launch our new #WomenInPrintedition , @espeedina variable limited edition print #softtouch is an exception cast plaster hand drawn lithograph is available to see and buy. Please visit us in Booth 12.

Every month we feature the work of a North West based artist. This month it is Emily Speed @espeedina Emily Speed is based at the Bluecoat in Liverpool and makes work that explores the power dynamics inherent in built space, using sculpture, film, performance, and drawing. Buildings can feel like an extension of ourselves, a second skin, and in much of Emily's work, the distinction between body and building is lost; a leg might become a structural support and fingers emerge from the tightly woven innards to clutch the structure’s own edges, barely holding things together. By making this link with the body explicit, her work draws attention to the fact that buildings are manifestations of the people and societies that construct them. 1 Floorplans (2025), photograph by Jules Lister, shown in Energy House 2.0 at Castlefield Gallery @castlefieldgall 2 Good Girl (2025) as part of Energy House 2.0 House Party. A resident of the house, Good Girl is neat, pressed and sits patiently in a corner. Her body is all finger, possibly wielding more power than we might expect.  3 Fossa (2023), photograph by Ben Deakin. Part of UNBUILD at Drawing Room, London. @drawingroomlondon 4 Flatland (2021) film still, made as part of the Art Northwest Award at Tate Liverpool @tateliverpool 5 Fingers and Daub, drawing on paper, 2023. 6 Innards, 2018, working fountain installed at Knole House, Sevenoaks and commissioned as part of A Woman's Place by Day & Gluckman with Trust New Art. #trustnewart 7 Façades/Fronts, 2018, still from performance commissioned for Look Again Festival, Aberdeen and shown as part of Happenstance, Scotland + Venice at the Biennale Archittectura 2018. [Front Slide] Rooms Designed for a Woman (film still), 2018 commissioned for [Re]construct at Yorkshire Sculpture Park. @yspsculpture

Encounters is a new artist’s book about Umbrella House, celebrated Japanese architect Kazuo Shinohara’s smallest residential building. Built in Tokyo in 1961, Umbrella House represents a pivotal moment in Shinohara’s career as he began moving away from decorative concerns towards his search for an abstract space. It was recently saved from demolition and reconstructed at the Vitra Campus in Weil am Rhein, Germany. Bringing together a range of responses to Umbrella House by practitioners working across fine art, filmmaking, poetry, architecture and Japanese calligraphy, Encounters introduces Shinohara to new audiences and offers timely new readings of his work. Foregrounding the voices and positions of women, the project expands existing technical, historical and almost exclusively masculine narratives around one of the most influential architects of Japan’s postwar generation. If you’d like a copy of the Encounters book once it’s made, please consider ordering in advance at the discounted pre-sale price of £15. Every donation we receive will help ensure production can go ahead as planned; and the more we raise, the more copies we can print, so the more widely we can share our work! Thank you 🙏 Contributors: Marcela Aragüez @araguezmarcela , Estefania Araujo Bianchi @estefiaraujo , DEHLI GROLIMUND @dehli_grolimund , Simona Ferrari @die_gesichte_der_simone , Takeshi Hayatsu @takeshi_hayatsu , Julie F. Hill @juliefhill , Sawako Nakayasu @snakayasu , Emily Richardson @emilyrichardsonfilms , Ana Ruepp @anaruepp , Lera Samovich @lerasamovich , Tomoka Shibasaki @shibasaki_tomoka  (tr. Polly Barton @pollybukuro ), Emily Speed @espeedina , Yuki Sumner @yukisumner , Mónica Verdejo Ruiz @monica.v_z  and Leigh Wells @leighwellss Designer: Marit Münzberg Editor/proofreader: Anjana Janardhan @studio_anjanajanardhan Publishing partner: Passengers @passen_gers 🔗 crowdfunder.co.uk/encounters-publication (in my link tree and @michaelanettell bio) #kazuoshinohara #umbrellahouse #artistbook #artandarchmichaelanettell

Super excited to launch this lovely collaboration with the brilliant Emily Speed @espeedina The Wormery was created to provide a beautiful, well-made, and flexible space for the children’s library area in Bootle Library. Worms agitate, dig deep, collaborate and create places for new growth, so they seemed the perfect inspiration for this space of discovery and learning. Like children, and hopefully artists too, worms can improve the spaces around them, and they are also wriggly. Produced by the amazing @linnyvenables - thank you for everything! Commissioned by @at.the.library_ an NPO partnership between @seftonlibraries and @rule_of_threes Upholstery of sofa (not pictured) by Imogen Woodings @bluebird_upholstery Materials supplied by @lathamsltd Made from @garnicaplywood plywood @valchromat_official and @himacseurope with some @jesmonite_ltd inlays. #childrenslibrary #library #storagesolutions #books #play #structure #learning #collaborate #create #seating #storage #plywood #valchromat #jesmonite #simple #playful #modular #emilyspeed #plaey

Editioning but not as you know it..... #WomenInPrintedition @woolwichcontemporaryprintfair

Taken a while but here are some images from Energy House 2.0 at @castlefieldgall back in May-July showing alongside @mishkahenner to present the results of our separate residencies at Energy House with @uos_artcollection . The large fabric works 'Floorplans' are quilted, cotton 1:4 scale hybrid clothing/ floorplans of (red) a Victorian detached house, (grey) a large new build home and (yellow) a one bedroom flat. I think there's more to do, possibly they need more limbs, or detail, they certainly need individual hangers. Do they need jewellery? Accessories? It was a brilliant chance to see the work, as they are too big to even lay out in my studio. I also showed two drawings, a small ceramic finger hook, and my favourite, 'Good Girl' a plaster, goat hair and pigment laden finger dressed in a pleated skirt. The start of this exhibition aligned with my son being very ill for the next month or so, so I only visited once, on the last weekend 🙈 and didn't really get my thoughts straight about it. There was going to be a publication, an artists book, but something had to go and that was it. Hopefully I'll be able to realise that soon. Thanks to everyone who helped on the show and that gave me time during my residency at Energy House, it was a brilliant time of gathering and finding new avenues.

Some drawings from 2001 - now ish. Island (lockdown sometime) Finger Gate - shown in @castlefieldgall this year Mound (another lockdown one, dreaming of Roman fountains) Leg Joint Study for Soft Inhabitant After Maso di Banco - during John Kinross Scholarship in Florence in 2001 Flatpack (iii) - shown at @exeterphoenixgallery a long time ago! Rooms Designed for a Woman (IV) - shown as part of my room at Tate St Ives After Gaddi - also made during John Kinross Scholarship in Florence in 2001. Mostly coloured pencil on paper, a little bit of pen and watercolour in places. Looking for something I can't find in the studio, but I found these instead. Funny to notice the different vibes at different times.