My work combines painting and line drawing, focusing on the use of bold colour and the depiction of expression within portraiture. It explores how, through the manipulation of colour, emotions portrayed in the imagery of an artwork can contradict the mood that it projects or the experience it creates.

 

My focus this year began with a series of small monochrome portraits, connected through the use of lines. It quickly became clear to me that my lines were rigid and uncomfortable, awkwardly situated around the portraits rather than communicating with them. ‘borderlines’ used poured paint as a background to trace creating a starting point to develop these lines, reduce this disconnect, and encourage fluidity in my work, before moving on to experiment with how lines could be used to create details and imagery in itself. I then brought this linework back into my paintings, where the work became much less forced, functioning together as layers of a singular work, creating a fluidity and movement within a static piece.

 

Alongside this development I was exploring the use of colour, in particular complementary colour pairs and the relationship between colours. I was drawn to the typically ‘unnatural’ or inhuman colours, especially within portraiture as this can be uncomfortable. Or alternatively, dreamlike. Glenn Brown[1] became an influential artist throughout these projects, with his garish colour palettes and use of brushstrokes to create a sense of life within the work.

 

I was interested in the sharp contrasts that could be created using bold and often contradictory colours. The progression of these highly contrasted paintings was not necessarily in attempts to create an illusion of depth or realism, but rather an investigation into the relationship of the colours and how they are situated together. In doing so, the choices of colour used for the highlights and shadows do not necessarily push forward or pull back, but rather they sit together decisively on the flatness of the canvas surface.

 

I then experimented with scale, which became a defining moment within my practice. ‘mam’ was twice the size of any previous work; a full scale close-up portrait, 1.4m high. This piece was also experimental on multiple levels, using UV lighting, situated on a black wall, with layered imagery throughout. Here I used the lines I had been developing to bring a second set of images to the larger painting, where the linework became more than just lines. This was a biographical portrait of sorts, exploring perspective, reflecting my mother’s life and memories within my own limited reality of her. The UV lights highlighted the smaller portraits, flickering like her memories within the larger portrait, which reflects how I see and think of her. The lights fluctuated like a heartbeat or a lifeline, bringing the smaller images forward, creating a pulsing narrative. ‘mam’ is a key piece within this project as it demonstrated the weight a painting can hold alone; how the paint itself, the colours and linework, can bring life to the work, without the use of lights for example.

 

This piece also established a trajectory to investigate the use of scale in portraiture, alongside the colour and linework. Thomas Sailot[2] was another key influence here, with his large scale oil portraits, typically close-ups of expressive faces. ‘mam’ was a considerably loud painting in terms of colour, which was reflected in scale, creating what could be considered a somewhat confrontational piece, despite the intimacy of the image being my mum. Even though the image was a personal and perhaps intimate moment, the scale throws any chance of privacy in the viewer’s face, demanding to be recognised and acknowledged.

 

My work is consumed by those around me; the people I live with, my friends, my family. While the faces I work with are important to me, this is not what is important in the work. The challenge remains in the confrontation, the discomfort of something familiar yet peculiar or awkward – the colours, the scale, the expressions. My current work moves away from the struggle of finding the perfect photo to paint, to do my loved ones justice or preserve cloudy memories. I am interested less about flattery and more about reality. A sense of the everyday, of authenticity, of relatability. Of the embarrassing. Of the unavoidable. Of existence.

 

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[1] "Glenn Brown". 2022. Glenn Brown. https://glenn-brown.co.uk/.

[2] "Thomas Saliot". 2022. Thomas Saliot. https://www.thomassaliot.com/.