Don't hate the media, become the media. Jello Biafra
Eleanor McLean
The Wicker Arms
Staffordshire St. Peckham
Images © Eleanor McLean
JUL, 29, 2025
THE WICKER ARMS
"Inspired by a fascination with folk horror, curatorial platforms ha.lf and the icing room come together to transform the space at Staffordshire St into an artist-inspired pub and immersive exhibition. Incorporating work from 20 artists, The Wicker Arms materially explores ideas around community, through which we refocus narratives of belonging."
Eleanor McLean is a British multidisciplinary artist and curator based in London. She is a 2022 Sculpture graduate from the Royal College of Art. You can discover more about Eleanor and her work here.
Hi Eleanor, it’s such an honour to chat with you ahead of the opening of The Wicker Arms Exhibition at Staffordshire St this August. Before we start, how’s your summer going?
Hello! Thank you so much for offering to interview me! My summer is going great thank you; I went on holiday with my mum to Greece last month which was new and exciting! I hope you’re having a good summer too!
Do nerves ever set in ahead of a new exhibition?
I do get a little nervous attending openings; it can take a lot of social energy and there's pressure to network and meet new people which can be out of my comfort zone sometimes. But having had the opening now I had a lot of fun and looking forward to participating in the upcoming events.
What was it about The Wicker Arms Exhibition that interested you so much as an artist?
I had worked with Ha.lf and The Icing Room projects before and their approach to curation is really exciting and creative, and I was very fond of a lot of the other artists involved as well! For some time now I have been making work in response to British pubs and I have been a part of several shows which explored the history of these spaces and it felt very same-ish, however this show I felt was exploring it more creatively and broadly.
Can you tell me a little bit about your piece that’s part of the exhibition?
I have a few works in the exhibition! I am showing a brand new work called The Highway Man, which is a painting of a pub my Dad worked at before I was born, and also got demolished before I was born, so the work has manifested through a collaboration of conversations about his memories of the place and using archives to help materialise it.
The hand sewn lampshade is called Temporary Dwelling. I was originally drawn to collecting old lampshades of this style after seeing them hung in a pub once. I’m very much interested in pub interior choices. With this piece I wanted to use materials which could loosely explore the fragility and precarity of a home due to lack of ownership and considering spaces which provide not only shelter but a space for memories, dreams and relationships to cultivate, much like the pub.
The lottery bar stool named Fingers Crossed explores how the lottery almost acts as a pedestal to pursue a wish or future thought that exists within a sense of false hope and deception. I was influenced a lot by my upbringing of my parents ritualistically doing the lottery and going to pubs.
How did you approach creating this piece within the folk horror theme of the exhibition?
The Highway Man in particular has an interesting dialogue with folk horror, it posing as a pub sign of a pub that ceases to exist, and before my time. A re-imagined ghost almost. Along the lines of this, I discovered a word - ‘Anemoia’ which means to feel a nostalgia for a time or place you didn't experience, which I think is really fascinating and poignant to today’s culture. Highway men are a traditional aspect of British folklore and also were very prominent in my hometown (Camberley) during the 1700s, with many pubs named after them, so it sparked something new for me to explore about my own identity too.
What does this piece say about you and the type of work you want audiences to explore?
I think in terms of an audience, it’s important to me that art is accessible to everyone. I think a lot of my work is drawn from tropes in British culture and personal memories, using found objects as well so I think it has quite a broad audience and perhaps sometimes specific to generations and class depending on the work.
The Wicker Arms is the centrepiece of Staffordshire St Festival of the Community 2025 and looking through some of your previous work: Pleasure and Delight, Wishes at Winter Sculpture Park, and The Lovers Pub, touch on an idea of community that I find really interesting. How big of a role does community play in your approach to your work?
Whilst I don’t hold much of a social practice, I explore community through my choice of objects and what I want the work to talk about. For example, with my work about pubs, I am interested in the culture and community that is built within these spaces. Traditionally pubs have been significant for working people to meet, for people to form new relationships and friendships, and a safe place for people to go.
Further to this, what type of themes do you like to explore within your work?
A lot of my work is fascinated with nostalgia as a cultural phenomenon. I am interested in how personal and collective memories can cross over and form dialogues where people might reminisce, and there’s an intimacy in this which brings a sense of community. I identify nostalgia in mostly interior objects, architecture and spaces where I like to introduce creative cathartic craft processes.
Pubs played, and still play, a vital role in our communities, what does a community mean to you?
Humans are naturally social and I believe we desire connection and a sense of belonging and building communities is a way of nurturing that need and liberating culture too. And I think pubs create a social fluidity for this.
Have you always had a passion for art?
I feel fortunate that when I was very young creative processes were very much encouraged as I went to a primary school that taught us drawing, painting and book making skills and took us on art trips. I always found art making cathartic. And I felt particularly on my BA course I had really valuable tutor time which introduced my passion for working more sculpturally and conceptually with my work.
As well as being a Fine Art graduate from UCA Farnham you’re also a 2022 Sculpture Graduate from the Royal College of Art. How much did your time at UCA Farnham and the RCA help to guide your artistic journey?
I think both university courses helped me to build context in my work, to draw on research which can take many forms to help you see how your work relates to the world around you, and how to talk about it. I had some really fantastic tutors, particularly on my BA at UCA who encouraged me to develop my education and practice further, and at RCA I built a really supportive network of friends/other artists. I found the dissertation module at RCA really beneficial too; it helped me refine my passion for writing and find my own style, and explore the relationship between writing and my sculpture.
How different is your experience exhibiting a piece compared to when you curate projects like Sandcastles by the Sea and Borrowing Tomorrow’s Happiness?
I really enjoyed curating shows as it helps me build a dialogue between my work and other artists’ and learn and talk about their practice too. It is also really confidence building to take a leadership role in organising and creating a holistic narrative for a show. Working on group shows such as this one brings surprises of new friendships and professional relationships. It’s a great way to discover new works and readings, and learn how other people curate and make too.
Has your creative approach to your work changed a lot since you started out?
I think over time as an artist you learn how to navigate what it is you want to say through different materials which helps you build a more cohesive practice, naturally also as you learn more about yourself too. The creative flow feels more relaxed.
"The way you display a piece of work should be a component of the piece itself and it’s another step to think about beyond the making part."
Within the context of The Wicker Arms Exhibition art can have a really powerful and emotional connection not only for the public but for the artist. Do you ever find it hard to let go of a piece and hand it over to the public?
Yeah absolutely. But I think that is where the work is meant to me. Whilst certain art making processes can be a cathartic release for an individual and very personal, art is for an audience, and it is to prompt a dialogue, otherwise you’re just hindering and isolating it.
Does your view of your work change during the conception creation, and eventual public display?
Yes sometimes, particularly with how I decide to display or hang it, or how I want it interacted with. The way you display a piece of work should be a component of the piece itself and it’s another step to think about beyond the making part. It also really helps to see it outside the studio in different contexts, it often feels smaller as well to me. Sometimes also through conversations with others you learn more about the work too or it can sometimes challenge it as well.
Any advice you would offer an artist yet to have their work part of an exhibition?
I think it’s important for young artists to be proactive in making opportunities and be a part of conversations because I think that builds valuable skills needed to be an artist.
And finally, what do you want the public who come to see The Wicker Arms Exhibition to take away from your work?
I think each work might be different but I hope for people to find something they identify with and spark conversation about perhaps memory, and rituals in culture.