My role is to inspire and connect infrastructure professionals across the South West, encourage policy makers to work with civil engineers to establish the best outcomes for the South West and involve a diverse range of young people in becoming part of the solution to saving our planet.

Responsible for 25k + members at the Institution of Civil Engineers

The South West Infrastructure Partnership (SWIP) is a collaboration of organisations and professionals from across the South West, all with an interest in how we shape our region and ensure we meet our net zero targets.Founded by the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) South West in 2017, with a panel of infrastructure sector experts, we now have representation from local and national bodies, including academia, local enterprise partnerships and organisations who plan, design, deliver and operate infrastructure, plus many other stakeholders.

My work explores our relationship to societal norms, the forbidden, and our desire to be admired and accepted – all questioned and manipulated through colour, texture and scale. Through binding a mix of precious and mundane objects with rope, ribbon and steel, I create monstrous but familiar household items. Tampered sumptuous fabrics and furs, seemingly exquisite representations of our desires, tempt but ultimately disappoint.Drawings with intense dark backgrounds made up of layers of graphite, are rubbed out to reveal people’s favourite possessions – fleeting memories of satisfaction and peace floating in an abyss.Recent paintings combine elements of both my sculpture and drawing. They play with scale, combining gestural sweeping strokes with fine detail, subdued tones contrasting with flashes of brilliant colour. They use metaphor and symbol to describe characters where trust, acts of kindness and unconditional love transcend a murky and menacing world of obligation, contracts and rules.