Song of Substance - Introduction
This body of work was produced between 1993 and 1994. It consisted of very large woodcuts printed by hand onto heavy brown paper, as well as large gouache works on paper and many small drawings. Photography was included on large and small scales.
The tangible presence of these works was important to me. The works were reduced in terms of colour and form, relying more on an elemental appearance and sparse earth tones to convey a sense of light and density that referred to the air and the ground: song and substance.
The titles of many works refer to death, as a way to acknowledge what we must leave behind at the edge of our bodies when reaching out towards external realms.
The works describe the capability of a material body to harness communicable energy and to transmit that to other domains. Images referenced the head as a conscious rock, a corporeal mass that is awakened by thoughts that radiate outwards, forming the external environment. As a way of demonstrating this magical occurrence in mundane terms, I used the model of the artist reaching out to affect the materials of art with an impression of his/her thought, and in turn becoming affected internally.
This circuit of expression/inspiration seemed like the transmigratory passage of spirit between two realms, which I explored in Transmigratory Passage of the Death Wish. Other imagery, such as the series The Effigy of Image, explored the flight of the spirit as a paradoxical notion: the attainment of flight through the acceptance of physical limitations. Another image, Dealing the Death of Me, examined the flat surface of the picture plane as an interface between two worlds.
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1. Introduction (You Are Here)
