Shadow Language-
I have written a few blogposts charting my painting progress this summer (a link here to the first of them if you missed it). These posts are a rolling record of my creative practice, sometimes trains of thought meander, which I have left in, as they reflect the process.
The shadows have taken centre stage in the last few weeks. I’ve been enjoying how they play on painted marks all through the summer- which has led me to look more closely at them- their colours and habits…outside and in the studio. Looking through my studio notes, I’ve written
Look closer at the edges of shadows- watch them soften and loosen, blur, fuzz, colour-swap.
Dark-shape after-dazzle- effects of vision
Mystery of colour in the shadows / shadow language
Monet’s garden by Vivian Russell-
I’ve been enjoying Vivian Russell’s book about Giverny this week. Talking about Monet she writes, ‘notoriously reticent to talk about his painting, he did tell one journalist this, ‘if you must find an affiliation for me, select the Japanese of olden times…their aesthetic that evokes a presence by means of a shadow, and the whole by means of a fragment’
I’m keen on this idea of focusing on a fragment or an aspect of an experience, enough to conjure the whole in the mind’s eye. Thoughts on shadows and the only just visible lead me to Tanizaki’s writing and a whole train of shadow thoughts (more of these in future).
Meanwhile, my summer sketchbook is almost full! The ease and flow of daily watercolours is a great start to a day- so I’m going with it and letting it run onwards at its own pace. The minimal approach I’m taking with these pages is acting as counterpoint to the heavier oil paintings.
I’m also very aware that my summer in the studio is taking place against ever more horrific world news – and I know that I’m trying to find stable ground in my head. I feel the need to discover a way of making paintings that can provide a framework for ascendant thoughts- hope, peace, potential. I need both feet firmly rooted in my own reality in order to try and get my head around the extreme greed, cruelty, violence and horror on show in the wider world. I look around the studio to paintings crammed full of layered and dense information and already know that my next moves will be to remove and edit. Some close ups details here (click on individual images to see them)
Some of these are heavy with paint, dark and slow… sombre even. Mmm, sombre – an eighteenth century French word which comes from the Latin subumbrare meaning ‘to shade’ or ‘cast a shadow’, literally sub umbre -‘under shade’.
How interesting that we use sombre now to denote sadness, seriousness, dull colour. I hear the ‘shadow fleet’ discussed on the radio. The idea of a fleet of tankers, in plain sight, which is named and discussed and deliberately used to evade sanctions by deception strikes me as extraordinary. Invisibility in your face! I wonder why it is known as a shadow fleet. It occurs to me that shadows have a bad name. Things can slide by unseen in the shadows, that is the assumption- although really things can disappear from view just as much in brightness (think dazzle)- and what of shadow dazzle…double invisibility?
These ‘dark vessels’ are also known as ‘grey fleets’ apparently- the language of deception seems to be shadowy and tonal – blurring identities, plausible deniability and flag changes-‘flags of convenience’. It’s all there. The use and misuse of naming and anonymity- a summary of our post truth times.
Writing this down makes me think perhaps it is no wonder I am finding ways to balance shadow dark difficult times with the lightest of colour and movement. There are definitely two distinct flows of work running side by side at the moment.
I write in my studio notes
I think I am seeking ways for both to coexist in a painting – making the balancing act the subject?
A few days of rain and flowers, not big rain, just summer drizzle, combining with bouncing flowers and orange fox and cubs ( which only open for the sun). The generous cosmos- delicate pink, sturdier than expected and upward facing. Notes to self-
‘ bring 2 media close which have v different qualities -perhaps they can meet in the subtle areas and flickers? Can a shadow hold light? Colour spots in shadows – negative/ positive interplay
And then Storm Floris blew in and whisked everything up. Just the lift I needed to agitate
and enliven everything. Finally these many layered paintings are starting to gain a presence – they needed a breath of big Floris air! Phew! Suddenly everything is moving forward.
