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2010-11
– These works are an acknowledgment of
the frequent
use of organic forms as a motif in my paintings. I have always been
fascinated
by the wealth of visual material provided by nature in my immediate
environment,
such as a vase of flowers, the garden at different times of day, local
trees
and streetscapes. The intimacy or familiarity with
‘domesticated’ natural
scenes allows an appreciation of the smallest variations within them;
and the
observed daily and seasonal changes offer a rich and ever-changing
resource. |
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Presentiment
is that long shadow on the lawn
Indicative
that suns go down;
The
notice to the startled grass
That
darkness is about to pass.
Emily
Dickinson |
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The
connections between gardening and
painting are
many: the ground is prepared, a plan is made and a dialogue begins
between
unruly materials and a desire for order. Both activities involve a
certain
amount of pruning, removing and deciding when to leave well alone.
There is
always a degree of artifice even in the most ‘natural’
gardens. In painting, unexpected
marks – ‘weeds’ – can be satisfying or covered
over.
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A few words about two of the paintings:
Ikebana –
it seems to me that I have often spent time arranging flowers
across a
canvas.
Kaiyu-shiki is a
Japanese strolling garden which requires the observer to walk
through the garden to fully appreciate it. It is based on the principle
of
‘hide and reveal’ – a technique which I have always
been interested in
exploring in my paintings.
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2007-2008
– Most of these paintings were inspired by a partial solar
eclipse in February
1999, when I observed the effects of the changing light and
shadow-shapes
in my back garden. Everything seemed to be hushed with expectancy and
there
seemed to be frozen moments when the image of the sun, partially
eclipsed
by the moon, became a crescent shape echoed over and over in the
shadows
of the leaves. Sometimes ideas surface slowly. |
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The
moon methinks looks with a watery eye;
And
when she weeps, weeps every little flower,
Therefore
the moon…
Pale
in her anger, washes all the air,
A
Midsummer Night's Dream
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Eclipse
is from the Greek ekleipo, meaning fail to appear. An eclipse
does
not solely veil or obliterate an object or light-source. The change
also
reveals objects obscured or gives new emphasis to unnoticed aspects.
Certain
objects pushed into the background allow other, previously unseen,
objects
to be revealed; and shapes and shadows mutate as the light source
changes. |
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There
are always ambiguous states between one thing changing from what it was
and becoming another. And of course paint itself is layered, is changed
and changes. |
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In
an
eclipse – as in life – even when you stand still, things
change. |
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These
works explore what is hidden and what is revealed by the layering of
paint,
focussing particularly on the transparent and opaque qualities of
layers
of white paint in an image, below, between and above other layers. |
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2005-2006
– These paintings were inspired by the richness of our immediate
environment,
which can often be overlooked as we pass by, absorbed in our own
interior
world. Sometimes small, fleeting things catch our eye and are
transformed
by our thoughts into momentarily strange and unrecognisable sights.
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2004-2005
–
These are from a series inspired by the sights of
materials/surfaces/objects
that are seen 'underfoot' in areas that the artist visits daily. The
material
of our everyday environment, whether it is from a landscape or a
domestic
space, can be full of strangeness and surprise. Things can suddenly be
seen as if for the first time and then associations and memories attach
themselves and complexity multiplies. The materiality of the paint has
been used as a response to these glimpses of the everyday.
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If
the purpose is to understand paint, then there is no utility in making
a sharp line between concepts and chemicals: a concept can be a
substance
in the mind just as a chemical is a substance in the world. Substances
occupy the mind as concepts, and concepts occupy the world as
substances.
Thinking in painting is thinking as paint.
James
Elkins
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