Nicola Field is a writer, researcher, artist and socialist activist who has lived in south London for 30 years.
Her creative, political and arts writing have been published widely and her book Over the Rainbow is published by Dog Horn Publishing. Her painting, drawing, ceramics and video have been exhibited at spaces across London including the BFI Southbank and the V&A.
She has been a socialist activist for 40 years, taking part in workplace and housing struggles, the movement for sexual liberation and anti-racism.
If you click on the menu, or scroll down on this page, you will find galleries and links to projects and campaign issues.
Her blog is focussed on her current PhD research in the Kingston School of Art at Kingston University, London:
‘Everything Became Queer and Unsafe’:
Fiction, Life-Writing and Family in 1960s and 1970s Britain
- All
- Text-based Art
- Visual life-writing
- Art
- Psychogeography and roaming
- Art Books
- Ceramics
- Video
- Writing
- Activism
- Research
- Journaling
- Photography
- From the Journal
Our Emotions Are Real
Sixteen large-scale digital prints from wild, expressive neurodivergent paintings and drawings. Visitors can participate by using art materials provided on site to draw, dream, protest and tell their…
Redrawing Maps
Kind Hearts: Marlow Bottom, Buckinghamshire Very unusually, a picture is getting worked on for more than one hour and over more than one evening. This map is of…
Bowls of the Earth
A selection from my handbuilt and moulded bowls.Available to view, buy and collect. Email [email protected] for details
THE STIM ROOM
A Gallery of Undrawn Drawings ‘Stimming’ describes the restless or repetitive movements many people do to soothe themselves, often while being expected to sit still, or listen, or…
Always, Often, Sometimes, Rarely, Never: Disordered Narratives & Quantum Process
An exploration of the use of metrics in mental health, by way of disordered poetics, visual text and the power of The Little Prince
Water and Dust: A Conversation with my Dad, about his Dad
‘My dad’s stories depicted in the images in this essay focus on his early life on the then new St. Helier housing estate on the Carshalton/Mitcham border in south London…’
Visual life-writing
Nicola writes: “Most of my visual work is life-writing. It’s an expression of feelings, thoughts, reactions, and stories from my life, and it’s evolved organically out of post-traumatic…
How to Be Strong
Nicola describes how she became interested in clay and various ways it can be used in art, specifically focusing on the use of clay as a way to express her feelings about her body, illness and the current political climate.
All the art!
A sketchbook made during a visit to the ‘In the Studio’ galleries at Tate Modern, with my friends and colleagues from Studio Upstairs Croydon.
Shop
Artworks available as archive quality, numbered artist-proof prints at any A size. As a guide, around A4 is £50+postage and A3 is £60+ postage – unframed. For sales…
Pages from 2019
Confronting truths and demons, putting in boundaries and further analysing the existential and material conditions of inner life in capitalist society
It Does You Good to be Told Off on Your Birthday
text and visuals © Nicola Field 2007soundscape © Fari Bradley 2007voice: Clare CameronSteam Control 2008 She is not really the one they want, Not if they had the…
Thank You, Universe
Text © Liz Bentley 2006 Soundscape © Stuart Bowditch 2008 Performance: Joanna Swain, directed by Rebeccah Hannah Video by Dan Thurley and Nicola Field Recorded at 15Hz Studios,…
We Are Getting Closer
I was first shown the technique of monoprinting at the Studio Upstairs in Croydon in the autumn of 2019. It really appealed to me as I had a…
Kentish Town to Brondesbury
A stretch of the London Overground on my way to visit my friends the writer Jan Woolf and the artist Tom Loffil who share a house in deepest…
Pages from 2018
Trying to describe relationships with self and others – and the horrors of interacting with the Department for Work and Pensions
Pages from 2017
Explorations of mothering and disability oppression, amongst other things!
Tell Me Tonight
text © Nicola Field 2007 soundscape © Steven Brown 2007 voice: Clare Cameron
Take Uncle John
text © Nicola Field 2007 soundscape © Steven Brown 2007 voice: Clare Cameron
I Belong
text © Cristina Teixeira 2007 soundscape © Fari Bradley 2007 voices: Clare Cameron, Gustave Ferrier, Nicola Field
The Dead Dog
text © Nicola Field 2007 soundscape © Steven Brown 2007 voice: Clare Cameron
Planet Earth
Planet Earth 7’31” ‘Days that open out onto one another, like rooms in a museum…’ Sensory overload and a dizzying wait for recovery: a train trip into the…
All She Wanted was Someone to Love
All She Wanted was Someone to Love 7’36” There was this man who said Come up north! He said: Come up, come soon I want to show…
Over the Rainbow: Money Class and Homophobia
First published in 1995 by Pluto Books and now republished in an expanded version by Dog Horn Publishing, Over the Rainbow explains the roots of LGBT+ oppression, confronts the…
It does you good to be told off on your birthday
She is not really the one they want, Not if they had the pick of the whole world’s good behaviour, but it’s Today’s the Day! and for breakfast…
A Wet Night in Mayfair
‘Words so real they can’t be true’ – an isolated woman’s light-drenched liquid fantasies turn from pleasure into poison… 5’52” voice: Karina Jones words: Nicola Field soundscape: Peter…
Progress Not Perfection
Unique, handmade ceramic objects. For families of all descriptions – and heartfelt fashionistas…
Scenes from an Unwritten Story
Six drawings made with oil pastels and ink on paper. Originally created at A4 size, they have been digitally reproduced at A6 and mounted together in one frame.…