Sleep Series
Using a selection of materials such as pencil, charcoal and paint, these drawings are an extended exploration of previously completed life drawings. Continuous random and intentional layering of the selected medium is followed by scrubbing and rubbing back both on a small and broad scale. The exposure of colours and marks from long discarded layers are revealed which in turn begin to dictate further application of drawing and painting.
In the journey of this addition and reduction, an informal and formal collaboration of colour and marks comes into play. The accidental begins to question the intentional. The flatness of colour reinforces abstract elements of spatial depth.
My work is motivated by the British artist Francis Bacon and his sense of the un-representational. He considers that if the figures in his paintings are irrational in their execution, then they seem to react to one's nervous system much more strongly than if they were done in a rational way – the reality of their appearance is more violent. If the making is more instinctive, the image is more immediate. Bacon, having said this, says that he still has the critical sense to keep hold, to maintain the balance of the conscious and the sub-conscious, to be able to know when to stop painting.1
1 Sylvester D. Interviews with Francis Bacon