Pillow.
Publisher: Watershed
Published: 2001
Place of publication: Bristol
Language: eng
First sentence: Annie Lovejoy is one artist who has, over the past decade and a half been using technologies 
in a range of innovative, challenging and highly original ways. Lovejoy is an artist of great 
integrity because she is not mesmerised by 'new technology' for its own sake. And though 
she makes ample use of modern electronic and digital technology within her art, (unlike 
many other artists who do so) there is nothing lazy or slapdash about her practice. Nothing 
she uses is ever merey for its own sake. Her use of computer programmes and high-tech 
equipment is always measured, restrained, and, above all, innovative. She realises that for 
her work to be valid, she must merge her use of new technologies to a range of processes 
that have in many ways become decidedly unfashionable. Her work resonates with skill, effort, energy, commitment and labour - terms very much out of sync with much of today's art world.

A few years ago, Lovejoy created a series of inter-related art pieces in and around the vicinity 
of an art gallery in rural Gloucestershire. In part, the work celebrated life itself, in particular,
the poignancy of short-lived lives. One of the recurring motifs and symbols of the exhibition 
was the metaphor of the flower. Flowers being planted, flowers growing - the cycle of life and death capable of producing things of startling beauty - even when death is an inevitable part 
of that process. One of the most arresting pieces of work in the exhibition was an old metal spade - itself a potent symbol of fertility, of growth, of life, almost as much as being the 
gravedigger's tool of choice. A small rectangular hole had been cut into the spade and 
a tiny video monitor, no more than a few inches wide, had been inserted into the created 
void. The monitor played footage of a field of bright flowers. Young life at its most charming, 
dazzling and compelling. The piece was beautiful, poignant and quite quite arresting.

Lovejoy is a prolific artist whose work always resonates with depth and integrity. She is, 
quite simply, an artist who believes in her work and believes in utilising a wide range of 
locations and contexts in the executing of her practice. In the execution of her work, 
she'll use original locations such as a coffee shop, or a field in the countryside, as 
much as she'll use the perhaps more familiar environment of the art gallery. 
Furthermore, her work is always moving forward, probing new territory, exploring a range 
of new environments. There is a creative probing and restlessness about Lovejoy's work. 
Not a hurried or fidgety restlessness, but a clear and discernible need for the artist to be 
always exploring and experimenting, if her practice is to remain credible.

Accomplished and adept at sewing, Lovejoy has put this singularly untrendy skill 
to astonishing use within one of her latest pieces of work. 'Pillow' is a wonderfully 
intricate construction of a pillow embroidered with interconnected electronic circuitry. 
Made with the assistance of Hewlett Packard Research Labs, Lovejoy's 'pillow' takes
a symbol of domestic intimacy and almost literally laces it with modern technology. 
And she does so in ways that demand engagement and interaction from the viewer.      
Eddie Chambers 2001

Eddie Chambers is an artist, curator, archivist and critic. 
A regular contributor to Art Monthly among other art journals and author of ‘Annotations 5: 
Run Through the Jungle’ published by the Institute of International Visual Arts 1999.
Description: A starting point for research and development of new work which is envisaged as a ’content provider’ utilising various electronic circuits to display audio / visual and interactive material. An exploration of emergent and redundant technologies: the prolification of components, hardware and data is intricately embroidered ..a tapestry of systems.
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