Dr. Tori McLean | Artist | MA RCA

Thank you to everyone who has come to play. #RCA2025

Elemental Kin 5 & 6 are showing at Three Rooms Gallery, 74 Beulah Road London, E17 9LE with @asdfasdfasdfcollective Thurs 14th & Fri 15th May 2am-7pm Sat 16th & Sun 17th May 11am - 7pm These two charcoal screen prints make visible what we’re taught to ignore. The portraits are deliberately without features, exposing generic faces that resist individuality. Translucent layers reveal underlying meshes and connected networks, showing how, despite our external differences, we are all built from the same stuff internally. Up close, external differences invite rapid judgement and assigned value; seen at a different scale, those distinctions dissolve into shared structure and material. Installed in A System at Scale, these works ask you to shift your view: when we change the scale of attention, systems of valuation that once felt fixed become negotiable, and the sameness beneath surface hierarchies become visible to highlight that we are all connected through the same biology. #ASystemAtScale #printmaking #charcoal #contemporaryart #screenprint ToriMcLean @creativeassembly_winchester @societyofdesignercraftsmen_sdc

Tori McLean (MA RCA, MSDC) is a contemporary artist and printmaker whose interdisciplinary practice interrogates how value is perceived, assigned, and negotiated within society. Her work examines who defines worth, how value shifts across cultural contexts, and what, or who, may be overlooked, marginalised, or undervalued in the process. Through layered processes that combine traditional handcraft with digital technologies, McLean creates works that interrogate systems of perception, cultural hierarchy, and social expectation, inviting viewers to question what we value, how those values are shaped, and what they reveal about the societies that produce them. A SYSTEM AT SCALE Opening: Wednesday, 13 May | 6–8PM 📍 @threerooms_e17 74 Beulah Rd, London E17 9LE Gallery Hours: 14–15 May | 2PM – 7PM 16–17 May | 11AM – 7PM

Although the girls are not on display together you can still see and play with the Crone at @towergallery.e13 E13 8AL today and tomorrow, before the exhibition Women by Women closes. I will be at the gallery from 2-6pm today (28th March) if you’d like to meet with me and chat about my RCA work and experience. #meettheartist #printmakersofinstagram #rcaprint

Some news that feels significant to me… My triptych of wall automatons - rooted in the maiden, mother and crone archetypes of the Triple Goddess - have been included in the latest publication from the @londonartcollective_official - ArtEvol: Voices from the Undefined. These pieces are not just objects. They came together slowly, almost like companions. Three presences holding different rhythms of time, transformation and memory. The maiden reaching, the mother holding, the crone knowing. I didn’t set out to “define” them - I only listened to what they wanted to be one. So to see them living within this beautiful publication, in conversation with other artists exploring their own edges of the undefined, feels deeply right. Not loud, not showy, just … aligned. I am so grateful for the opportunity, the community and everyone who continues to support my creative journey at this personally difficult time 🤍 If you are discovering my work for the first time - then welcome. There is so much more to come. #ArtEvol2025 #londonartcollective #contemporaryart #emergingartists #artistoninstagram

WOMEN BY WOMEN: Tori McLean You Don’t Own Me and Where Does My Value Lie (Crone) “Tori McLean is a UK-based multidisciplinary artist working across print, sculpture, and installation. She holds an MA in Print from the Royal College of Art (2025). Her practice examines how value is assigned to women, questioning who is seen, who or what is overlooked, and why. She explores how cultural systems, language, and habit shape perceptions of worth. Drawing on printmaking, play, and material experimentation, McLean interrogates stereotypes and hierarchies surrounding female identity and visibility. Using surface and material she creates tactile, object-based works that expose deeper structures of power, judgement, value and harm.” #contemporaryart #cockneyguggenheim #internationalwomensday

I rarely post about anything other than my art practice on instagram - but today I felt the need to do something different. Ive been a bit quiet on instagram the last few days. Sometimes the pressure to post to help keep followers interested in your practice feels overwhelming. Instagram is a funny old thing as we often offer a very curated life. Although it is lovely to celebrate the highlights in our lives, it rarely shows the daily reality that we are living with. For the past year mum has struggled with breast and lung cancer. This has not been pretty. A slow, protracted, painful and distressing road to death where we’ve tried to give her as much dignity as possible as the body begins to fail. Dad has been her rock doing everything in his power to meet her wishes and let her die at home. My sister and I have done what we can - although it has never felt enough. Yesterday this beautiful woman left us - trying to smile when she probably felt least like doing so. It has been heartbreaking to watch and I can only hope that she is now at peace and pain free. Bye Mum and thank you for you. 10.9.45 - 11.3.2026 xxx

On International Women’s day I wanted to highlight the work of some of my favourite pieces by female artists at the Women by Women exhibition @towergallery.e13 This exhibition explores the many facets of women, along with societal expectations. Examining from how women are perceived to how we should be celebrated it is a fascinating exhibition made and curated by female artists. I’m delighted to have my work included as part of this exhibition and will be available to talk about the ideas behind my them on 28th May. Please pop along. To visit Open Fri, Sat and Sun until 29th March Open 2-6pm Tower Gallery E13 8AL #internationalwomensday #artexhibitionlondon #femaleartists #femalesrtistsofinstagram

My automatons are often semi-autobiographical and this one, You Don’t Own Me, explores a difficult relationship I was in before meeting the amazing Mr M. Much of my work uses play and hints of humour to explore difficult topics confronting women. This interactive automaton exposes the hidden realities of domestic violence. Viewer control of the figure mirrors how abusers manipulate and restrict freedom, reflecting the isolating, unseen life victims endure (where safety, choices, and autonomy are controlled by another) and captures the unsettling paradox of concealing danger to protect oneself. Viewers control the figure, revealing how abusers restrict freedom and isolate victims. The work captures the paradox of concealing danger to survive, showing a life where autonomy, safety, and choice are constrained by another, making the unseen and unsettling painfully visible. Come and try for yourself @towergallery.e13 6th - 29th March from 2-6pm Fri, Sat & Sun. It is on display to be played with at this incredible exhibition of Women by Women. E13 8AN @rcaprint @societyofdesignercraftsmen_sdc

My work examines how women’s value and worth are assigned and perceived. Who in society gets to pigeonhole us, why do we accept this, how do we break from convention? My automatons aim to examine some of the archetypes that are impressed upon us and question them. I will be showing The Crone as part of the Women by Women exhibition @towergallery.e13 from the 6th-29th March Open Fri, Sat, Sun 2-6pm. Come along for a play but I hope the question she poses makes you pause and think about the roles women are often assigned and question why this is the case. The Crone challenges the often invisible, relentless emotional and physical labour consuming many women’s lives. Its deliberate, resonant movement invites reflection on how these cycles limit opportunity and self-realisation and critiques how economic systems exploit female unpaid labour yet refuse to value it.

I’m delighted to be a part of this exciting new exhibition about to open at the Tower Gallery E13 called Women by Women. The gallery is open Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays 2pm - 6pm. I will showing two works ‘Where Does My Value Lie? (Crone)’ and ‘You Don’t Own Me?’ Both are object based works exploring the value of women to expose deeper structures of power, judgement or harm. #automaton #femalevalue #rcaprint #printmakersofinstagram #fineartprint

Thank you @societyscottishartists for selecting my wall-based automaton for installation at the Royal Scottish Academy. The exhibition was outstanding and beautifully curated. It was an honour to show my work with your fellow artists.