The Presence of Absence
In ‘The Presence of Absence’ Isobel Kidd presents a life-sized installation of women seated together on the grass, evoking a scene of quiet gathering and shared reflection. At first, the composition feels familiar: the natural gestures, the relaxed arrangement, and the casual presence of a basket of fruit recall a moment of everyday human connection. Yet, as the viewer draws closer, this impression of life begins to fade. The figures are hollow shells, exact casts of real bodies and their surfaces devoid of colour or warmth.
Kidd employs this absence of colour with intention. The pale, monochrome forms strip the figures of individuality, transforming them into echoes of human presence rather than portrait’s of specific people. The work becomes a meditation on memory and time, on the residue of life preserved in form but emptied of breath.
The reference to Manet’s Le dejeuner sur l’herbe is unmistakable, yet Kidd overturns it’s vitality and sensuality. Her women do not invite the gaze; they resist it. Devoid of pigment, expression, or narrative context, they confront the viewer not as subjects of beauty but as silent witnesses to existence it’self.
‘The Presence of Absence’ captures the moment after life has passed; the trace that endures when human presence has withdrawn. Through stillness and restraint, Kidd transforms an ordinary scene into a contemplative reflection on impermanence, identity, and the quiet evidence that life, once present, leaves behind.
