Earth, painted black, textured and dense, contains root fragments, its blackness implying underground dark depths, boundless and deep - profundis. The manmade structures on top of this soil, alongside the plants that grow from it, speak to our relationship to land, to the soil and to how it is ‘owned’, used and fought for globally. This new body of paintings feature parts of buildings and plants of the artist’s local environment. The buildings are non hierarchical, have been reduced to their essential shapes and taken apart, in places lying as rubble, at other times reminiscent of toy- like wooden architectural maquettes. Their simplicity of shape and the familiar plant forms that burst forth are elements that would be recognisable at any time in modern history.
While the paintings are composed of everyday elements, the work is embedded in a time of global instability and crisis. The human figure does not appear within the these paintings, but there are traces of the individual human experience everywhere in the work, of life witnessed and experienced on a daily basis. Paintings of nettles are imbued with colour and vibrancy - each colour and brush stroke as unique as each leaf that grows in nature, influenced by its local environment and conditions. There is a playfulness, and reassembly of the basic subject matter within the paintings. The chosen colours, for example in ‘Red Earth’ describe a space through the prism of lived human experience. The form the buildings take in the work are not representative of how they appear locally, but are opened up, taken apart, topple and crack.
Titles such ‘Mirror, Mirror’ allude to the act of looking, of viewing. ‘Mirror, Mirror’, like the age-old fairytale asks us to question what we see, what the current state of affairs is. ‘Monitor 1’ and ‘Monitor 2’ are in the format of a living room tv, each framed in abundant plants drawing the viewer in to look at what is framed within - notice the interrelation and repeated fragments in these works. The internet overloads us with undigested information, and we live with the threat of societal manipulation through social media. These paintings do not present any new information, but rather suggest new ways of looking and give space for the viewer to look and think, to form an individual opinion. ‘Haven’ shows fragments of spaces, modular type shapes can be seen in the background, fallen pieces in the foreground, the title alluding to our basic human requirements for a roof over our heads and the dignity of having a personal space. Again, the colour and composition are playful, suggestive of re-thinking, of problem solving.
Nettles, brambles, thistles feature in the work, at times painted decoratively within a taped sections, at other times breaking from their contained spaces, tumbling across the picture plane. These plants are thorny, inconvenient, pollen-rich and depicted full of character. The abundant thriving plants act as signifiers of hope and regeneration in this shared space of the manmade. ‘Mesozoic Dance’ features delicate magnolia flowers, a tree that has existed for over 95 million years, before bees had evolved. Its dancing impermanent petals belie the strength and persistence of this tree that has survived and thrived since - despite all - since the time of the dinosaurs.