Meet Jessica Illsley, the Artist Channelling the Divine Feminine

This week, artist Jessica Illsley will open her solo exhibition, ‘Humbled By The Void’, an exhibition of 16 large-scale oil paintings at London’s Zari Gallery. Although Illsley makes music – creating music for video games with her alt-pop project bubba hush -, art has been her main passion from childhood. Since then, she has exhibited at Brixton East, The Soho Hotel, and The Bayerischer Hof in Munich, and her last solo collection ‘Blue Nudes’ (2021) was a sellout. Illsley speaks to me over video from her studio, a wooden building filled with plants, large artworks and a bed (for both sleeping and working).

Hi Jess, it’s good to meet you. Run me through your studio?

My studio is complete chaos, which I love – it’s just piles of paper and images and books everywhere. I’ve let mother nature kind of have its wicked way with it. But I’m losing light – all of the jasmines are growing over the windows, which is a little bit problematic.

Has art always been a passion for you?

I was surrounded by a lot of art growing up. My dad is also a painter, and he would take me around galleries. I used to sleep in his studio in London, which is just like paint and turps and was probably so bad for me, but it’s very nostalgic. Since I was really small, I’ve been into art. I used to bore people silly about it. 

You graduated ten years ago – how do you feel your art has developed? Has there been any major changes to your technique and style?

I really like the Picasso quote: “It took me four years to learn how to paint like Raphael, and a lifetime to paint like a child.” That freeing-up does take a long time. I did a lot of Chiaroscuro training, which involves using light and dark. It’s only now that I’m starting to branch away from that. 

I used to be really into the Masters, like Botticelli, but loosening up definitely shifted my inspiration – now I love Picasso and other abstract artists. But it is important to have that basis of being able to paint technically. I feel like that stands you in good stead to free yourself up later on.

Looking at your work it’s clear that themes of divine femininity and spiritualism come up regularly. Why are you drawn to that?

The divine feminine normally refers to sort of an idealised representation of femininity. I really want to show women as complex, multifaceted beings – sexy, strong, fragile, vulnerable. I want to invite the viewers to rethink dominant cultural narratives, which can be quite limiting.

I’m also discovering more about the fragility of existence and the body and soul. When I paint, I’m exploring the space where the physical form sheds its limitations and finds this ethereal kind of force. 

Where do you get that inspiration from in daily life? 

I use images for inspiration, often vintage porn from the 1800s. I just really love the black and white photography. I love the light and dark and it makes everything a bit more gestural. So I do use that some of the time for inspiration, but the faces in my work are often just random. 

Could you run me through your process, taking me from the idea to the finished product? 

I might just go and look in a pile of stuff and fish out a few images, and rip some things out of books, and then put them all on the bed. I’ll get some feeling and colours from that.

I’ll always do an abstract on a blank canvas. And then I will more intuitively go with it after that. Alongside art, I’m also a psychic medium, and a lot of the time I’m not really conscious of what’s going to happen. I can feel very guided to paint in certain places, and faces appear on their own terms, like they’re using me to come into creation. It’s quite an interesting way to paint.

Do you find it hard to know when it’s finished?

It’s so difficult. Today I’ve really been battling. Iit can sometimes be one tiny line, and then it’s all balanced. Then sometimes it takes days, and you just battle with it, and there’s always that chance you can overwork it and screw it up. 

Your exhibition ‘Humbled By The Void’ is coming up this week. What is the inspiration behind the name?

I have found a lot of comfort in this void between this matrix and what’s on the other side. I’ve grown a lot, I’m humbled by it. Before I wondered ‘Why are we here?, ‘What’s going on?’, but now I understand everything a bit more. 

What do you hope people take away from your work?

I want them to be moved in a way they don’t understand. It might be subconscious, and I’m pretty sure it will be for most people. 

How has it been exhibiting art with your dad? 

We haven’t actually put our work side by side before, so that will be really interesting. When I was growing up, I used to mess around in his studio with him, but this is on a different level. It will be really cool to see them together – I’m proud to be doing it with him.

Where do you see your art going next? Is there anything else you want to try or experiment with?

My pieces are already quite big but I would like to do work on a much bigger scale. My current studio doesn’t allow that at the moment, but I’m looking into doing a residency in New York, in a huge space. 

It would also be really nice to have a white space. My current studio is wooden, and it’s lovely, but it’s a lot of colour, and I usually have to take my paintings out of my studio to see if they’re finished or not. So it would be good to have a bigger studio to create huge works.

If you fancy trying your luck at getting on the private view’s guest list, you can register your interest here.