I’m working on a series of paintings that’s been rattling around my head for a while. It’s an attempt to describe a certain sensation I felt on my first trip abroad — heart exploding with all the intrigue and feeling that comes with an influx of new information, a shuffling of perspective, a more elastic worldview.
Travel does that, falling in love does that, art making about falling in love and unrequited love does that etc... it all feeds that sensation.
The same image always comes to mind: unlacing the chest, pulling back the skin to reveal and release what’s beneath. What stews or swelters or pours or floods out may change, but the expression of calm bewilderment is about the same.
I’m a bit out of practice, struggling to recall basic anatomy and foreshortening, trying to articulate something in a forgotten language.
It is an attempt to reconcile the sense of awe & overwhelm at being a deeply feeling human, when we are at our most inspired and most raw.
