ramble on

Hooray - studio time - lets go.

Starting with this:

I harbour many approaches to making a painting, but perhaps central is my exploration of the relationship of paint with surface. Mostly I am interested in the potential of orderless marks in the whole painting process, taking each painting as far as it will go. Drawings and photographs are randomly selected and referred to in an ambiguous way, but can give vital reference points in navigating the course of the paintings' construction.

June 2009

To this:

Adopting strategies is key for the continuation of making. No single plan or strategy dominates or a set formula adhered to.

Any method discovered in the making of the painting is used and or tested but may not take the painting all the way to its final conclusion.

There is a drive to take the painting as far as it will go, to explore all possibilities. This seems to be the key objective that is consistent with my work.

Often paintings will fall by the wayside and be put aside in the studio for long periods of time.

Sometimes they may declare themselves finished before they really are.

At each stage of the painting consideration is given to its status.

The paintings are layered and I often use masking tape to cover specific areas before applying an allover coat onto the surface. This is just a way of masking or blocking.

The shape of the piece of tape torn off is just like the mark of the brush from the gesture.

Some areas on the surface become textured and built up. When layers are added.

Some paintings have begun as collage, built up cut up canvas or board pieces on MDF.

Figurative elements that get thrown up in the process of applying paint is an accidental thing and does not aim to have significance, but may play significance in the piece for the short term.

It will often act as something to go against.

Good bits of painting, areas that work compliment or contrast or happy accidents are lost or painted over for the good of the whole painting.

The painting as a whole will be considered before this happens, so the plane or surface on the painting is the reel of film and so the 'editing' occurs with the use of the masking tape on the chosen areas.

What I am trying to achieve with a painting is the thing having a presence of its own.

By this I mean having its own life through suggestion of what is and what is not visible to the eye. The painting as an physical object with sensations experienced and related to, but made sense of.

We try to see how one thing relates to another and maybe see things as a whole and but only certain things are revealed to us.

Something along those lines.......

In our lives we are governed by deadlines and therefore we make choices how we divide time up and spend the time according to our needs and interests.

Anyway far too much ramble.