What if a room could become a self-portrait?

This week in the Reflection Room, psychologist and researcher Leila Ainge pairs a painting by Lottie Cole with a simple but thought-provoking reflection about identity, environment and the spaces we quietly create around ourselves.

Drawing on psychology, art and everyday observation, this episode invites you to look differently at the rooms you spend time in and to consider what they might reveal about who you are and who you're becoming.

Perfect if you're looking for a few minutes of calm reflection, creative thinking and a gentle psychological prompt to carry into your week.

https://lottiecole.com/

https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-britain/sargent-and-fashion

https://thehomepage.co.uk/the-art-of-home/

Welcome to the reflection room.

This is a tasting tour for August.

If you've been curious about joining us in September,

this is our third prompt and everyone is paired with either

art or poetry or both. We often think

of self-portraits as photos, paintings,

or more recently, selfies of faces.

Portraits are really...

fascinating to study in galleries because they've been posed or staged

and I always want to know what was the purpose of this portrait.

I went to see the John Singer Sargent exhibition a few years ago

and I was amazed at the way in which his portraiture could elevate

a social status of the sitter or the person who had commissioned the art.

Contemporary artist Lottie Cole does something completely different.

What she gives us is paintings that don't feature the person,

but the interior that the human might have occupied.

Now, psychologists have long recognized that our environments influence

how we think, how we feel and behave.

We don't just live in our surroundings.

they become part of our identity.

It's an extension of who we are.

The places that we spend our days really reinforce our routines,

our values, and also the ways of seeing the world.

In Lotte's interior work, the rooms are empty of people,

but they are filled with everyday objects.

I like to think of them as clues,

which make them really deeply personal.

There's a chair that might be pulled out,

a window, and often when you look through the window in Lottie's pictures,

you'll see either a season or a bird or something.

In the image that I've selected,

which is potting shed goals, there is gardening tools waiting to

be picked up again. So in this sense,

the room becomes a portrait of the person who inhabits it.

So the image I'm sharing is this one that I've not seen on a website,

but it is on Instagram called Potting Shed Goals.

And I love this image so much.

I'm someone who definitely has goals for what a good garden or potting shed might

look like. The reality, which I will share with you in my email is very different.

I've actually got...

an old Hessian bag from a vegan shop in Chalton which has got laser cobwebs on it.

It's a remnant from my time living in Manchester.

There's a really old poster on the door that was left by the old house owner

and if you were to look at my photo compared to the interiors of Lotte's then

my photo would tell you a lot about who I am.

It says that I've had a whole chapter somewhere else and

You know, I've moved into a well-loved space,

but I have made it my own. Your reflection prompt today is to pick a room,

any room, and imagine it through the eyes of Lottie Cole.

What objects would we find? What is finished or unfinished?

What do we see through the window?

What would we learn about you that isn't that obvious?

P.S. I was gifted membership to the Bromley Library in Nottingham

by the wonderful psychologist Madeleine Powell.

And this is going to help me sit and focus my PhD writing.

But this library has a garden and a potting shed that is goal worthy.

So I'm taking it as a cue to go and sit in there to draft

our final reflection prompt, which lands with you next week.

That's all for now.