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Golden Years[ read project statement ]
PROJECT STATEMENTMy works attempt to give voice to the anonymous. I aim to embolden these young people, presenting them as individuals full of passion and vitality. Yet there is a sorrow at their core and I seem to be drawn to the fragility of their youth in its temporal state. In my works I have often elevated the status of these young people to that of literary heroes or religious figures playing out contemporary morality tales or urban myths. Immersed in the notion of a Generation X and its sense of nihilism, I mix this with the romanticism of the Pre-Raphaelites and the Baroque. They seem lost and abandoned, yet too beautiful and colourful to be sorrowful. These portraits offer the subjects the opportunity to leave their own statement and exist for eternity. Through a vibrant pallet they shine like a Renaissance masterpiece, encapsulated in a Utopian ideal of love, peace and spiritual understanding. The Golden Legend is the primary source from which these works are drawn. Narrating the lives of the Saints these colourful tales form the basis of my depictions of youth, as each Saint is suggested through their own individual attribute, which has been abstracted almost beyond recognition. Each character is thus elevated as they are transformed into contemporary martyrs. Yet their own martyrdom is never suggested and so in this way the language of art is employed, but only to question how we view youth within our society. Within the methods I employ there is also an element of escapism through the repetitive and laborious hyper-real process of painting. This is also mirrored in the subject and their sense of reality. Through this technique the viewer is drawn into the paintings by the almost hypnotic patterns created on the surface, and so in this way they can sympathise with the characters and individuals portrayed as they emerge from the canvas. These depictions of youth are in a sense an expression of society? existential angst, highlighting human frailty, and so become works of redemption against which nothing seems so unbearable or insurmountable. In a society awash with cynicism, words like kindness, mercy and tenderness seems now slightly embarrassing, but through my paintings and the people with whom I work, these are feelings I hope to attain from the viewer as they look at a portrait that could be a depiction of their own youth in all its fragile beauty. |
