| This work examines the politics of heritage. Inspired by a residency in Rome, these new works, Stop and Search, in gouache on gessoed board, carry these messages in a mosaic-like form. These texts emphasize the legalities that inform our political landscape and will be our bequest, which transcends potent messages across borders. I am building walls with blocks of color. They teeter on the edge of perspective, almost flat like Klee, but the shapes have an animated presence, reminiscent of Guston’s comic-like shapes. I am interested in color and in the way we perceive color as abstract, but always attach it to something. I am interested in the very tenuous social relationships we make with color. I want to develop small bodies of color that relate to specific ways of thinking about color as it lies in my mind. |  |
This work examines the politics of heritage. Inspired by a residency in Rome, these new works, Stop and Search, in gouache on gessoed board, carry these messages in a mosaic-like form. These texts emphasize the legalities that inform our political landscape and will be our bequest, which transcends potent messages across borders.
I am building walls with blocks of color. They teeter on the edge of perspective, almost flat like Klee, but the shapes have an animated presence, reminiscent of Guston’s comic-like shapes. I am interested in color and in the way we perceive color as abstract, but always attach it to something. I am interested in the very tenuous social relationships we make with color.
I want to develop small bodies of color that relate to specific ways of thinking about color as it lies in my mind. It will always quiver on the edge of just being a series of marks or blocks. I think of these works as mapping or building in the imaginary, then make it sort of real without losing their ability to degenerate into just being marks or blocks of color. Some works are produced through a series of annotated marks. These marks are not dissimilar to the repetition of the stitch that makes a cloth, or the hammering that makes a sheet of steel, or the tile that makes a floor. These works are often in a state of degeneration, or possibly yet to be built.The degenerated mosaics and buildings during a residency in Rome influenced me when I was awarded an Abey Fellowship by the British Academy in 2007. The mosaic works are made up of small spots. I like the idea of putting Brigit Riley’s works in the washer on the wrong cycle so that modernism is shrunk and organic. Experiencing life feels like inhaling fresh air. It’s not like you take a book, read a chapter, and you’ve gained this or that. For me, I might go read a book on a haystack in the countryside, and then I get in the zone, experience that daydream. This daydream is actually another way of taking something “out of context,” and the book is merely a catalyst. I think it allows, for a brief instant, one to rise to an ever-so-slightly higher state.
