It’s a waiting game
I’ve wrestled for ages for a suitable name for this red, black and white abstract painting. Likewise with the timing of it’s release. It’s been done for quite a while now but for some reason I have hesitated in putting online. It’s a funny thing really – sometimes you just have to live with it in your own space until it’s the right time to show it. I can’t disassemble that any further but now is definitely the right time.
Splish-splash
The colours are favourites of mine, no doubting that. But rarely do I ever go quite as minimal or bold as this. So let’s establish the technique before we go on; it’s a single splash of red enamel paint. No point avoiding that or dressing it up to be something it isn’t.
However, the word ‘splash’ is probably a little inaccurate. In order to get paint to travel it has to be accelerated otherwise it just stays in one place and moves outwards from a central point. If you want it to cover distance you have to throw it. And that’s where the dangers arise.
Luck or skill?
I think that entirely depends on your point of view. Let me answer that by saying that it was my intention to create a reasonably contained ‘body’ to the splash application and then let the excess move outwards. I certainly didn’t want to cover the whole thing (as I have done in a few previous paintings) and I didn’t want to keep it all in the centre.
No, this was all about weighting the painting to one side and letting the rest of it find its own way. So I suppose you could say I am both skillful and lucky at the same time.
How does this make you feel?
Now that we’ve established the technical things we are inevitably brought to the question of your emotive response.
My focus group (who see everything first) really don’t like this painting. I’ve never had unanimous rejection before. But undeterred I press on with its publication anyway. I have had comments telling me it looks like a road accident; one said it reminded him of the thing they pull from Neo’s stomach in the film The Matrix. My mum loves it though which is surprising given her conservative tastes.
One recent visitor to my gallery said it looked like a bird of paradise (how nice) yet another said it reminded her of death.
But it’s all good, for one good reason
So let’s end on a positive note; it is very striking. It’s highly emotive yet also beautifully executed. It’s got balls, it’s unapologetic and it will definitely split your friends into the lovers and haters. But it is also redeeming.
It is rebellious and confrontational but if you can get beyond that it’s one of the most precious, singular and bloody-minded forms of self-expression as I have ever created. One single shot of life in a world that is dead from the neck up.
Please, go find your own splash moments and live them. Find your pulse. Energize yourself. Celebrate your uniqueness. Dance, shout, swear, love, sleep.
Then call me to arrange delivery of the painting…
