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Between Wu and Yu, oil on canvas © Pip Dickens
“In the process of colouring (painting)
the surface of the canvas (the
picture plane)
should receive the greatest possible
richness
in light-emanation-effect and,
at the same
time, it should retain the transparency
of
a jewel. The light and form should
control
illusory oscillation into space
and out of
space…The pictorially decorative
effect is
achieved through musical contrasts
and rhythmic
relations conditioned in space…for
every
medium contains its own rhythmic
laws and
thus its strict limitations through
which
it is distinguished as the specific
way of
expression that it is."
Hans Hoffman
on ‘The Aims Of Art’, 1932
The series of ‘Oriental’ paintings
are partly
influenced by motifs, shapes
and forms from
Chinese and Japanese culture.
They are ‘extractions’
rather than direct ‘lifts’ of
these elements.
In so doing they are not comments
on Oriental
culture but arbitrary forms that
develop
and change through the application
of a variety
of painting mediums. They are
observed details
that have been amplified to produce
a new
‘language’.
One intention is to convey a
sense of celebration
of the source material – kimonos,
priests
robes, fans, kites and ceramics
for example.
The paintings develop this idea
of celebration
in that they are playful, colourful,
over-the-top
decoration. Thus the issue of
a painting
as a decorative object is taken
to its extreme
– they are all about decoration;
they are
foppish; they are over-the-top.
Their second intention, or gravitas,
lies
in the painting methodology-
of exploring,
devising and applying contrasting
(and novel)
ways of using paint and other
mediums to
produce the overall character
of each painting.
For example, the melding of flat,
patterned,
transparent, layers of coloured
varnish with
dense, textured paint forms.
Formal divisions
within the painting mark changes
in tempo
and acknowledge formal design
issues that
one might observe in decorative
objects,
for example the panels of a kimono.
Roundels,
fan shapes, blossom and wave
shapes are examples
of motifs.The fundamental laws
of a medium
having its own limitation (as
expressed by
Hans Hoffman) is played out in
these works;
of testing mediums and their
application;
pushing for new ways of creating
illusion,
contrast and light; of creating
‘jewel-like’
areas that reveal the value of
a pure colour
for what it is – a beautiful
colour.
to see paintings from this series
click here
See also SHIBUSA - Extracting Beauty (Japanese influenced paintings) and book
launch of the same name
See also Katagami Series - preliminary works on paper toward SHIBUSA
- Extracting Beauty
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