Desenho de modelo no século XIX
Although it’s often dismissed as a purely “technical” concern, representation has been one of the most enduring fascinations of my life. The idea that you can take charcoal, pigments and oil and arrange them in such a way that they can almost become water, flesh, gold or satin, is invested with a power and mystery that is hard to put into words.
Seen in this way, drawing and painting become more than just vehicles for self-expression, they can serve as a way of interfacing with the world- a way of asking questions from life, a way of slowing down and learning to actively appreciate the miracle of existence, a way of generating stillness in the midst of chaos.
The result is a kind of artwork that is effectively a love letter to a person, to a tree, to life itself. Work that stems from our desire to hold onto things and, in a small way, to safeguard what we love against the creeping impermanence of our lives. This impulse, common to all of us, flourished in the 19th century, and it’s the source of the tremendous kinship I feel with this period.