New Paintings @ Ken Segal Gallery
Statement
The paintings in this show were all created in 2008-2009 and all except for one are concerned with the urban landscape. In each of the paintings I challenged myself with a new palette of colours, a new kind of brush-work or a different kind of composition. The one painting that deals with the wilderness landscape, Lightning Strike–Poplar Treeline uses the roughest paint handling of any of the paintings, while Edge of the Suburbs uses the coolest surface of any of the works in the show.
Most of my work has concentrated on the contemplative image, and so I have sought out compositions that will allow subtlety and simplicity to dominate the world that I have created.
Suburban Street-Hazy Day is the most complex in terms of layering the space created by the perspective of the road winding off to the right. Each layer is defined by different clusters of trees, leading to the final tree line shifting to bluish green in the mist of afternoon haze.
As with much of my past work, the human presence is alluded to rather than depicted, so houses, streets, automobiles and other elements in the modern urban environment point to how humans have a created a world that suits their needs. And yet the forces of Nature are always present, altering how humans interact with that world.