undercurrent
Spoken language has its limitations; it’s difficult to get messages across distance as messages can be distorted, hearing limited, all communications, verbal or visual, get changed, often repeated, changed again. I am interested in these ideas. My paintings develop out of language, thoughts, feelings, sometimes singular, sometimes multiple, always changing. My paintings collect words, letters and notions of conversations in my head.
The original thoughts often become lost buried and layered. These serve as merely a starting point for the formation of writing on the canvas- like the opening sentence of a story. The looser scripting and cursive elements are often jumbled as I serve to get my thoughts on the canvas. Repetitive Letters become broken abstracted forms leaving fragments of conversations weaving in and out of the canvas.
Undercurrent sees a return to tonal blocks of colour where the conversations are painted away- like light breaking through the canvas. The abstraction of text and letters find solace in the landscapes of our mind. The colour palette is also reminiscent of water ,sky and the timeworn rock of a harsh climate. There is an edginess to this- an undercurrent where storms and rifts exists in the pursuit of halcyon days.
It is these complexities–“that which is not said” - that is the source of Undercurrent.
For me there is something comforting in the repetitive process of writing over and over- forgetting less about what I am writing but getting lost in the process of doing.
These thoughts are like intricate knots, the logic eluding me as they knit together to form an entangled structure that is dense, complex yet delicate. I write my feelings or thoughts which in turn go forth to the next. It is impossible to hold a thought isolation- and why would we …
Influences and admirations
Christopher Wool Cy twombly Yayoi Kusama