4Me4You Features - ‘A Warm Life Through Butter’.
Each painting becomes an invitation: not only to see, but to feel, and to discover the extraordinary in the seemingly mundane.
Raised as a beekeeper’s daughter, Ponsonby’s early exposure to beeswax shaped her approach to art. Working in layers, she builds and reduces, crafting each panel with molten wax poured and buffed into primed wooden surfaces.
This process is followed by countless cycles of mark-making, erasure, and return, using blades, brush ends, and even her fingers to soften and simplify the surface.
The colour palette in this series is deeply instinctive and personal, with a recurring buttery yellow that emerged organically, an unspoken symbol of contentment.
For Ponsonby, “Every painting is a self-portrait in that my conscious and subconscious have worked hand-in-hand to coax it into being.” ‘A Warm Life Through Butter’ is a testament to her belief in the power of shared experience.
In her work, the boundaries between the artist and viewer dissolve, often adapting her compositions to invite the audience into the scene.
Whether pulling out a chair or reaching for a glass, the viewer becomes an active participant in the world Ponsonby creates, forging a deeper connection with the work, and with each other.
