Sunday 5 October 2014

Three, Four (Mixed media on canvas 80cmx100cm) July, 2014

The stance a work takes interests me. We're faced with a bewildering array of choice when we have the blank canvas before us and the process of settling on the stance is perhaps the one I pay the most significance. A work can show something, tell us something, perform for us as would a street juggler or try to seduce our sensibilities through the use of various lyrical stratagems. It can aim at reminding us of something, make us aware of the niceties with human perception through an arrangement of visual stimuli or indeed shock, frighten or make us smile, all depending on what the intention of the artist is at the time of the execution of the work. Quite like in everyday life where we take a stance amongst our fellow humans, every work on show everywhere has a stance assigned to it. The promise of unlimited possibilities in communicating ideas or impulse, although a seductive one, carries certain problems with it. What can be shared with others by the adding of paint to a flat surface? How true, or to use a less absolute term, how clearly can a stance be shown? This is what I find gives a work its backbone, its resistance or indeed its strength.