Gem 2005 - Statement
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The gem series approaches the conflicts between the beauty of gemstones and the cost at which they are mined - both environmental and human. We live in a world - in a time, where our own pleasure and the need for luxury and beauty, give precedence over the rights and needs of others. In a political climate of arrogance, ignorance and greed at the cost of virtually everyone, but the richest and most powerful, the role of art has once again gained drastic importance: Artists must be unwavering and give society a mirror to reflect it's obscure obsession with possession, power and misguided patriotism. With this series I hope to provoke the idea that sheer beauty has no value. Beauty is not merely something you can buy, it has a cost that is not monetary and that even the richest can't pay.
This series calls upon it's viewer NOT to buy gemstones, when they are mined at the cost of the environment and the laborers and local residents. Proposing instead to make an intelligent and informed choice and to encourage consumers and industry alike to find more suitable methods of mining and/or alternatives to gems in jewelry.
Approach
Rather than re-creating a landscape on a canvas, I aim to express its essence. Obviously, no single work can hope to distill the complex spirit of a landscape, much less the infinitely sophisticated ecology that sustains it. So, in order to capture this richness, I work on a large number of paintings concurrently. At the earliest stages the theme itself often dictates decisions concerning composition, materials, and format. I prepare a large number of working surfaces, typically involving a minimal, organic, underlying construction of wax and bold colour, over which numerous layers of paint allow the final image to evolve. This allows me to transport strong elements and effective techniques from one piece to the next. Each multi-layered rendering shares some details with the other works in the series. The overlap of elements enriches each individual expression and deepens the cohesion within the series. Ultimately, each piece captures some fragment of the landscape's power until the larger body of work coalesces to express its deepest essence. The use of raw pigment, wax, scrapers, and other manual and tactile instruments and materials, create texture, forming the template from which the landscape is abstracted, and as a result, validated in the context of the late 20th/early 21st century culture. A delicate integration of colour and tone in the overall composition counterbalances the aggressive, spontaneous mark making. Although I have often integrated a variety of textile materials and processes into my paintings, my primary fidelity has been to painting itself as a medium, in all its bewildering variety.
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