Translated into gestural, sensory marks, my practice presents interior monologues in a tactile exterior form. Through responding to my observation of fleeting moments, the mundane is emotively enlivened or preserved, and instances recontextualized through the act of painting. Through this process, these moments of banality and cyclical elements of life are transposed into theatrical instances, creating a sense of otherness and an intrigue in the unknown. The intensity or quietness of each brushstroke is formed simultaneously to the emotion felt whilst doing so and intended to be felt by the spectator. With this varied painterly vocabulary, the paintings collectively feature both tension and serenity. Heightened emotions and states of being are conveyed through the collective atmosphere of the works shown.

Exploring themes of intimacy and intrusiveness, this body of work encourages the viewer to question their position with and relation to the subjects within the paintings. The viewer is guided into an observational perspective, a reluctant voyeur peering into fragmented points of privacy and solitude. Subjects are presented averted, unaware of a spectator’s presence.  ‘Watching Me, Watching You’ challenges this. The subject is observed yet presents themselves returning a strong confrontational gaze to the viewer. Through this arrangement, it is implied that the viewer is both the spectator and the subject themselves.

‘Glimpse Through a Doorway’, presented through a keyhole-like view, invites the viewer into a private moment, without revealing all. ‘Those Who Stare’, appears familiar in the sense that it depicts an everyday occurrence yet distant in its absence of context, intense colour palette, and vagueness within shadow. The instance is taken somewhere beyond its initial context. Although stood together in unison, the protagonists appear isolated and separate. The significant light which the subjects’ gazes are directed to is suggestive of something beyond the canvas, inaccessible or out of reach. The ambiguity sparking the viewers’ curiosity.  By its position next to ‘Rotten’ and ‘Glimpse Through a Doorway’, I seek to evoke an enhanced feeling of vulnerability and uncomfortableness within such paintings. Through the juxtaposition of different paintings throughout this body of work, it is intended that they will be read differently in conjunction, further evolving thematically.

They appear to an extent impenetrable. The limited contextual information within the closely cropped compositions, in addition to the obstructive hazy layers of paint, prohibit the viewer from full access. Weaved together, these figures and spaces appear slightly detached, ungraspable in this enigmatic atmosphere.