Sue Webster, Biography

Sue Webster is an artist who established her reputation in the mid-1990s, working with her then-partner Tim Noble. Together they rose to prominence making abstract shadow sculptures assembled from seemingly random objects. These sculptures, when lit by a single light source transformed into representational self-portraits. To make something from nothing became an important part of their DIY signature approach, influenced in part by the philosophy of British Punk. Alongside their shadow sculptures, they also took light sculpture into a different realm, creating signs which perpetually flash out messages of everlasting love, as well as hate. In 2002 Webster famously collaborated with Sir David Adjaye - one of the world's most imaginative architects. The Dirty House in Shoreditch, was the first of two distinctive and ambitious residential projects realised together. More recently they saved the ultimate structure-with-a-story, taking the infamous Mole Man of Hackney's derelict ruin and transforming it into a bespoke home and studio which won best London dwelling in the 2021 New London Architecture Awards.

Webster published the visual biography I Was a Teenage Banshee in 2019. A Künstlerroman (artist's coming of age novel), the book combines personal memoir with a visual narrative of her evolution as an artist and describes how listening to Siouxsie and the Banshees helped guide her through a troubled adolescence. Full Leather Jackets, (2019-2021) - a suite of 18 hand-painted leather jackets emblazoned with the band's imagery - was presented in the form of a fashion show held in Sue's studio using 18 of the artist's friends and misfits to model her creations in the style of punk icon Siouxsie Sioux.

In recent years, Webster has been painting in oils, turning her focus inward to create a striking series of large-scale self-portraits. These works depict a woman defiantly pregnant in her fifties, with a prominent belly, often dressed in a defaced leather jacket peppered with Siouxsie and the Banshees badges. The imagery evokes a modern-day Madonna, echoing the iconography of the Virgin Mary while reflecting Webster's own complex experience of motherhood. This series marks an unexpected and exciting new chapter for Webster as a solo artist.

Sue during her A Level Art class, Longslade sixth form, Birstall,
Leicester, 1984.