Maisie Cousins' "Sweet & Sour 1" is a vibrant composition featuring a mix of purples, pinks, and oranges, emphasizing the wet textures of petals, seeds, and organic materials. The piece showcases abstract close-ups resembling a blend of food and nature, evoking both allure and discomfort. It embodies a hyper-realistic photographic style, capturing intricate details that blur boundaries between beauty and decay. Cousins' work challenges societal norms by celebrating raw, visceral experiences and invites viewers to embrace imperfection and chaos. ...
Maisie Cousins’ photographic practice marries beauty and disgust, interweaving food, trash, flesh, insects and decay into a kaleidoscopic world of colour. Seeing things through Cousins’ eyes takes us into a bright and saturated Wonderland of toys, icecream, lips, stomachs and tongues, smears of lipstick, jelly and juice. It’s our bins, sinks and childhood bedrooms visualised by Barbie, coloured in by toddlers. It’s glorious, nauseating, glossy and stunning. Cousins’ compositions take us into a fever dream journey through a visceral, grotesque circus show. Her practice encourages us to let go of our societally imposed niceties, to eat in the nude, to spill, to smear, to befriend the trails of ants on the plate of dessert from the other night that we left on our floor. Be dirty, be trashy, be happy and be beautiful, all at the same time. ...
