Claire Nichols

is a London-based artist working with performance and sculpture. She has been developing Variations, a series of audio-visual performances, since 2017. She creates live drawings in space with materials that are often formless, sometimes dispersing sawdust and flour into closed spaces, or using lights and mirrors to make improvised shadow formations. These constellations are triggered by a musical score in a live performance. Through her Variations series, she works with improvisation and live performance, exploring how these modes can offer meeting points between the fields of sculpture, movement and sound. These forms and disciplines unite to become hybrid performances in process. Nichols’ Variations series has been recognised via the Barbican Arts group Trust Main Prize Award, selected by Florence Peake and Tai Shani in 2018, and the PLÁKA Porto Award in 2023. The series has been exhibited at galleries including Florence Trust and Arebyte, London; Space 118, Mumbai; Hangar, Barcelona; and Maus Hábitos, Porto.