New Forms: A Study of Broken Parallels, CB Gallery 2017

This body of work explores the materiality of paper as a medium, by engaging with its limitations and thresholds through saturating, tearing, folding and erasing the paper’s surface. In contrast to these controlled manmade processes, I have allowed for an organic process to take place. Water is used as a carrier for pigments, incorporating its natural flow and evaporation to inform certain uncontrollable marks on the surface. Essential to the paper making process, water is a powerful force that acts as a builder and destroyer, an archetypal symbol of birth and life.

Throughout this body of work, I have explored different tensions that have arisen. Firstly, the tension caused during the papers interaction with water, which causes it to warp and change shape. Secondly, an imposed structural tension that operates between the organic marks and the geometric forms, which sit on their surface.

A recurring geometric form is the circle. The circle is a Jungian archetype for the psyche: a symbol of eternity, wholeness and unity. It has no beginning or end. When combined with a square (the body archetype), it highlights the relationship and balance between the psyche and the body. While the circle is eternal, the black circle alludes to the void, an absorber of light, a repressed shadow side. In Japanese philosophy the Void represents a connection to creative energy and spontaneity.

The exhibited drawings, prints, paintings and collages represent a process of unearthing identity and exploring its evolution. By working with a combination of structure and chance, the work allows for a vulnerable space that is both evocative and indefinite.