I remember how it made me feel…

Jane Butler’s research-led practice focuses on the experience of trauma and the relationship of body and mind to external environments. Her work forms a series of enquiries into the vastness of the human mind, and examines the differences in how we perceive the environment and process its information.

Known for her large-scale, site specific public interventions, this exhibition offers a reflective moment in Butler’s practice, bringing together two years of research. It draws on the writings of Bessel van der Kolk, Oliver Sacks and Antonio Damasio and references the theory of embodied perception; the idea that the body, its movements and its interaction with the environment fundamentally shapes people's perception of the world. In art theory it refers to art that is experienced in the body, where the audience participates in the work and is transformed by the experience.

I remember how it made me feel focuses on both corporeal sensitivity, and cognitive dissociation. It poetically considers the physiological responses of the body and why some people are more affected by what they experience than others. The artist’s own personal experiences inform much of the imagery within the show; the series of passing clouds viewed through the SAD therapy screens refer to periods of dissociation in her own life.

In this immersive exhibition at PS², the artist has altered the gallery space and created a series of artificial landscapes within it. Each element of the show uses light responsive materials and objects associated with wellness, therapy and care to visually explore a range of neurological effects and open up a dialogue into the complexities of the human mind.
 

About the artist

Jane Butler is an artist and organiser specialising in public and site-specific projects. Butler received a BA Fine Art (Sculpture) from Ulster University in 2009. Butler was a Co-Director and chair of Catalyst Arts (2012-2015). She is currently a Co-Director of Household, who work collaboratively with artists, writers, curators and the public to develop thought provoking projects in the public realm. She participated in Freelands Artist Programme, London (2019-2021). Commissioned by Belfast City Council, PLACE and TULCA Visual Arts Festival, Galway to produce site specific projects. She is also an active member of Array Collective; a group of Belfast-based artists who create collaborative actions in response to issues affecting Northern Ireland, who recently won the Turner Prize 2021 in the Herbert Coventry Museum, with their installation The Druthaibs Ball, 2021. She has also recently been commissioned by an institute in Poland Goyki inkabator 3 to create a site specific work on their grounds this summer.