Biography

Siobhan Wall has worked as a senior lecturer, a writer, curator, and artist. Her writing on photography has appeared in Eyemazing magazine and she has written seven books about tranquil places in busy cities, including Quiet New York, Quiet Amsterdam, Quiet Paris, Quiet Barcelona and Quiet London. She has BA degrees from Cambridge University (English Literature) and Central St Martin’s College of Art and Design (Fine Art and Critical Studies). Siobhan obtained her MA (Distinction) in Visual Culture at Middlesex University and she has a PGCE in Secondary Education from the Institute of Education, London.

For over a decade she was a senior lecturer at London Metropolitan University, teaching video documentary, cultural studies and photography. She taught with Professor Shelley Sacks on the  Fine Art  BA at Oxford Brookes University. Above all, however, she enjoyed teaching on the MA in Museums and Contemporary Curating at the University of the Creative Arts, Epsom.

Aware of post-colonial debates, she has curated exhibitions of work by Iranian artist Shadi Ghadirian, as well as Capturing Paradise: Western and Non-Western Art Influenced by Islamic Culture in Essex. She sees awareness-raising as an important part of her art practice and curated Precious, a joint show with etchings by Dame Paula Rego in Cambridge to raise much needed funds for Womankind Worldwide.

Using her politically informed practice she became the artist in residence with The Clean Clothes Campaign, where she curated The Clothes She Wears; a collection of clothes worn by eight women working in the garment industry. Stories from women in Romania, Sri Lanka, The Netherlands, Mexico and four other global locations were also included  in an accompanying catalogue.  This ground-breaking show  travelled to Paris, Worthing, Ghent, Utrecht as well as the Royal Geographical Society and The Fashion and Textile Museum in London. Informed by debates on the globalisation of the garment industry, The Clothes She Wears reveals concerns about women’s pay, hours and working conditions. Siobhan is not only concerned with discriminatory practices at work, however. She also raises awareness of the particular pressures on women to conform to idealised perceptions of  female beauty. Inspired by the writings of Julia Kristeva, she makes drawings which reveal the hidden narratives about the representation of imperfect bodies, illness and desire.

In 2016 she curated Drawing Work, an eclectic, international exhibition of drawings about the experience of work 17 by artists from India, The USA, Indonesia, The Netherlands, the UK, The Czech Republic and Turkey. This was shown at CBK Zuidoost, Amsterdam in February 2016. Siobhan also wrote the catalogue and gave a drawing workshop inviting participants to make a 3D cut paper model of their  ideal place of work.

Siobhan lives in The Netherlands and has a studio with OARZO, (Stichting Ateliers Zuidoost). She has spent the past few years  writing, editing and publishing  books of drawings about Britain leaving the European Union. Her first book in the series, Borderless, was launched at the Small Press Book Fair (Beurs van Kleine Uitgevers) in Paradiso. She recently published Borderless II and III, other books of poetry and drawings made in response to the decision of 58% of British people to leave the EU. Borderless II and Borderless III  includes work by artists and writers from London, the USA and Amsterdam.  Her photobook Vintage Advice for Corona People was published in summer 2020. She is also working on a series of drawings in collaboration with Amsterdam based performance poet Heli St Luce.