fs2200xx

I am interested in the discourse of painting and the language of figurative painting in particular. Situated within this discourse I am concerned with the aesthetic quality of paint, mark making and the materiality of paint on the surface of the canvas. Life, decay and death are the elemental subjects of my paintings.

I work with unpromising subject matter (manic dogs and withered petals, over-exposed machinery and ill-lit figures) that raise questions of mortality.

My primary subject over the last five years has been  a group of peonies that died and rotted slowly in my studio. The paintings produced over this period contemplate the still slow process by which the flowers turn from beautiful silk softness to a dry papery thinness, brittle like old chard flesh. I am drawn to the fragility of the flowers and the notions of decay, change and loss they embody. As the work has progressed I have come to focus on the delicate glass vase perched on the edge of unsuitable tables. These works have been a space to explore my feelings about loss, love and identity.

More recently I have used the female form in a series of self portraits that were sparked by the need to revisit my own identity when I was able to end a long-term negative relationship. Where most seated portraits give something in the way of a nicely hand-made photograph my self portraits are challenging. I explore notions of sexuality, isolation, violence and fragility.