A PERSONAL PHILOSOPHY: MOVING TO GREECE
I haven’t shared anything I’ve written in a while. Part as grounded exercise, it seems the world demands your attention and experience as part of entertainment. The latter part is well, because I haven’t wanted to share anything. Life’s been good and busy. I’ve been making a lot of things and as mentioned previously, I’ll eventually share fully formed paintings and projects when they reach fruition. Until then, here’s something I wrote about a recent diptych which will be hanging in a place I can’t mention just yet. Enjoy x
-
Intermission, From the River, 1 & 2. 2023. 70 x 140cm. Acrylic on canvas.
INTERMISSION, FROM THE RIVER : 1 & 2
I recently have only
Written secret things
In secret moments
Made only to be spoken
As loud as a whisper
For current times
Something kind
Curious
and deafening
Ears eager to hear
and
My tongue dry from the heat
and
Speaking. I’m now asking
Where do we go from here
-
It’s not about moving to Greece, not yet anyway. It’s possibly about this tough economy, Greece laughs at my sentiment of tough economy but at least they have the sunshine and I’d love to have a share of that pie.
This painting was originally a nod to another place, which if you know, you know. That undercurrent is still present however I could feel this needed to remain behind the curtain. A secret thing written at secret times and secret doings.
It’s not the first time I’ve painted about going elsewhere when there’s work to do. Maybe I prefer the quiet life of solitude and work. Being left alone to it with minimal conversation - interesting for a writer who speaks as though she’s in conversation repeatedly through out the day. I dislike talking about the work until the work is done but even once the work is complete, I’m not sure all the words are necessary. ‘Say it with your chest girl’ are words from Lucy which stay with me. And since the chest has expanded in other ways past the vocal.
So it’s not running away, the question ‘where do we go from here’ said with a twinkle in my eye isn’t even a question. This is not meant to be a departure. Rather like so many paintings, a statement of exploration into a sure unfamiliar but non-terrifying, exciting, adventurous, ‘what-will-we-find-here’ terrain.
Painting was always about saying the moment without the dreaded usual grammar because so much of so much we experience through other means, dimensions and sensibilities. I think I convinced myself of extroversion, although sometimes extroversion comes cleaner and naturally than it maybe does today. And yes conversation with chosen persons is where the heart sits but more so I’m not reaching for silence at that pinnacle and the moment lasts no longer than it has to. Maybe I do prefer a solitary quiet life. No I’m not a Capricorn, but somehow still very much so.
These are blue-green spectrum paintings, which I didn’t see myself painting in this way again for a while. Maybe as a tough love to myself, as though I’d already explored this path. The feeling was stale. But this isn’t stale, it’s comfortable & kind, and we humans can mistaken stale with comfort forgetting the kind. If I’m at ease with chosen humans who bring me comfort which is welcomed in again and again, then what is it with the paintings that I miss that sentiment. Get comfortable. Go search and explore in comfort, for the time for wretched heat and exploration at 3am is always around the corner. But so is the before and the aftermath of the occasion which holds you like a cooling calm sea. So, once again, I’m asking the soul a few things she already knows, what’s the hand we’re choosing today. And with a bigger smile now. Say it with your chest girl, where do we go from here.
Happy secret adventuring 🌊
