The inspiration for this painting was David Sylvian’s 1986 album ‘Gone to Earth’.

I listened to the album on cassette tape in my studio and the title track ‘Gone to Earth’ was still very significant to me seven years after its first release in 1986. The albums original cover art by Russell Mills was inspired by Sylvian’s then interest
in Rosicrucianism and Gnosticism, particularly the writings of Robert Fludd. The title track ‘Gone to Earth’ features Robert Fripp on guitar playing discordant chords. I wanted that discordant feeling in the painting and the guitar sound influenced my decision to drag the paint across the surface of the painted image creating horizontal paint marks. The reference for the painting was a collage I made comprising of a photocopy in negative of a George Stubbs painting of two figures in
a landscape. One figure holds a dead rabbit.*

Over this image I placed the black and white photograph of the trunk of an oak tree that obscured the central area of the landscape. Using this collage as a reference for the painting and listening to Sylvian’s music, the painting was made in a number
of days in my then studio in Aungier Street, Dublin. The lyrics at the end of the song “And though voices may holler for all they’re worth, the rabbits have fled their borrows, gone to earth”, reminded me of the 1950’s film by Powell and Pressburger
titled ‘Gone to Earth’. The B side of David Sylvian’s album ‘Gone to Earth’ is entirely instrumental and the track ‘Answered Prayers’ is also particularly significant.

*I used this negative photocopy of George Stubbs painting ‘A Repose after Shooting’ (1770) again as a visual reference for a painting I made in 2011 titled ‘The Wood-landers’ oil on panel.