The process of painting is essentially a sensual experience; the act of creating is akin to the growth of loving intimacy.
Initially there is excitement, attraction and curiosity. Your every fibre desires to explore, to understand, to know and to be known. You are attentive, your senses awakened to nuances, to subtleties in form, colour, sound and touch.
Like intimacy, creativity requires passion, focus, sustained effort and tenderness. Love and desire need to motivate you to care deeply, to act courageously, without self-consciousness. You have to take a risk, to be real, to expose yourself to the possibility of a critical eye or rejection.
As I paint I revel in the physicality of the experience – the paint’s luscious buttery consistency, the familiar smell of linseed oil, the vibrancy of the pigments. I am enthralled by the changing relationships of layered colours on the canvas, the flow and drip of the paint, the shifting forms and shapes – a delicate balance of interaction – of activity and receptivity. The subject matter, landscape, clouds, a happening in nature, captivates my heart and I am both protagonist and prisoner to the power of the creative act.
Bliss, joy and fulfilment are all possible.
A new year and a new body of work… following a compass into to the unknown