Ayden Beck

Throughout last year I focused on my mental health and looked at the more playful aspects of my art. I find I often go back to the female body. Throughout history we see a narrative surrounding undervalued women whose bodies are manipulated and used against them, so I wanted to spin this into something new. Instead of reinforcing a damaging gaze I wanted to create collaged figures that move the body in confusing yet exciting configurations. My work celebrates overlooked perspectives and encourages audiences to see things differently. I look at my pieces and see fun disturbances that make people smile or want to engage with what they’re seeing.

Ayden Beck is a Latin Canadian artist who is currently in a stage of change and discovery in her practice not to be confined within one category. As a racialized person, yet growing up in a sheltered and more privileged background, she sometimes feels as if she should not be the subject of her works. Thus, Ayden’s work places her more as the creator and observer than the subject. In the artist’s practice, she is hesitant to be tied down to specific identifiers. Although her works are deeply introspective and personal, Ayden does not present herself as the subject. She hopes that her works can be utilised as a starting point for more discussions on the idea of representation of the self for any individual. The basis of her practice is found objects from glamour magazines, with idealised and edited models moderated to aestheticize their bodies while marginalising their individual identities. By cutting the images out, Ayden makes her pieces decontextualize the bodies, taking them out of a context that could be potentially marginalising and giving the figures autonomy with the whiteness of the walls.