Boyarde Messenger is exhibiting her work at the Affordable Art Fair this weekend.
Inspiring South London artist Boyarde Messenger is exhibiting her controversial art work at the Affordable Art Fair in Battersea Park this weekend.
The artist, who studied at Wimbledon School of Art, centres her work on liberating the female form, which is topical as the first day of the exhibition falls on International Women’s Day.
The artist, who is often mistaken for being gay, said she has always been inspired by the female body as ‘it is the most beautiful thing ever’.
Her Pop Art Bottoms, depicting women of shapes and sizes, aims to encourage positive body image and bring out the ‘inner goddess in all women’.
“Nice plump juicy bottoms are a good place to start because they’re playful and mischievous. They’re not sexual images, so it doesn’t intimidate women,” she said.
Messenger was first inspired while travelling in Belize where women were less critical of each other and more accepting of their own curvaceous bodies.
“In the western world we are so influenced by media and women are so competitive with each other,” she explained.
“Painting a woman gives them time to appreciate their own body for what it is.
“It’s an empowering process. I get my empowerment from it and it’s liberating for the women that is being painted and to the viewer.”
The artist, who describes herself as a traditional painter who uses the body as her canvas, has sold paintings all over the world.
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