Josie McCoy captures the here and the now to subvert the very nature of the 21st century’s celebrity culture. Her beautifully created works owe nothing to the supposed fifteen minutes clutched at by those on the periphery of fame. McCoy celebrates the virtual, those who do not exist, suspending our disbelief and drawing us in.

McCoy’s recent series of oil paintings are portraits of characters in Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar’s films. ‘Becky’ is Marisa Paredes’s character in High Heels; ‘Marina’ is Victoria Abril’s character in Tie Me Up Tie Me Down; and ‘Elena’ is Francesca Neri in Live Flesh.…

Josie McCoy captures the here and the now to subvert the very nature of the 21st century’s celebrity culture. Her beautifully created works owe nothing to the supposed fifteen minutes clutched at by those on the periphery of fame. McCoy celebrates the virtual, those who do not exist, suspending our disbelief and drawing us in.

McCoy’s recent series of oil paintings are portraits of characters in Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar’s films. ‘Becky’ is Marisa Paredes’s character in High Heels; ‘Marina’ is Victoria Abril’s character in Tie Me Up Tie Me Down; and ‘Elena’ is Francesca Neri in Live Flesh. McCoy was drawn to Almodóvar’s films because of the fascinating array of complex characters which often revisit themes such as the power of female relationships, fluidity of identity and authenticity.

For McCoy, painting offers a version of reality in the same way films do. Both suggest that mimicry can seem more real than that which it seeks to imitate. Using oil paint like watercolour, McCoy builds up the paintings in thin layers to make the surfaces glow, thus creating an imitation of the cinema screen. The green hue that is almost always present in the flesh in her work, references traditional painting techniques, where green was used as ‘under-painting’ to give luminosity to the surface colour. The blue hue that is often used suggests the glow of the screen.

McCoy is graduate of Central St Martin’s College in London. She has exhibited widely in London and throughout Europe, and her work has featured in many shows, including the BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery and Artfutures at the Royal Festival Hall.

She currently lives and works in Valencia, Spain.