Parallel Lines of Enquiry EXHIBITION and now the Jerwood

Discords II

Charcoal, pencil, chalk and wax, on Arches HP.  56 x 56 cm

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Discords II shortlisted for the Jerwood Drawing Prize 2012.  The Jerwood Prize Exhibition opens at the Jerwood Space London on 12 September 2012 and later tour in the UK.

Image part of the work for the exhibition at The Allsop Gallery Bridport Arts Centre, Dorset, UK,  24 February to 24 March 2012.

The drawings will be shown parallel to a short story by French writer Alain Robbe-Grillet.

The focus of the exhibition will be work arising from the Fellowship which I completed at the Ballinglen Arts Centre, Co. Mayo, Republic of Ireland, 2010 however I intend to show this work alongside copies of the actual book, highlighting the way in which it runs parallel to my work and processes rather than provoking it. On a loop in the background will be a soundtrack of the text being read against a backdrop of the sounds of sea and gravel at Chesil Beach in Dorset.

De Profundis Nocturnes

Soundscape IV

Charcoal, graphite chalk and wax 2011.  56 x 56 cm

This drawing, part of the De Profundis series of work,  won the Drawing Prize At the 159th Royal West of England Academy Exhibition in Bristol.  The open exhibition consists of 508 works selected from a submission of over 2000 and runs until the 31 December 2011.

De Profundis

First Nocturne

Second Nocturne

Fifth Nocturne

Tenth Nocturne

Ninth Nocturne

This work is related to music both the sound, particularly strings and piano and the physical movement of a bow or hammer and the way in which plucked, bowed or struck strings vibrate. They suggest the regenerative nature of music, both listening to it and playing it, as well as its power as a trigger for memory. Rather than using it as a primary source, music as diverse as John Cage or Steve Reich through to Plainchant functions alongside and parallel to my work and practice.  As in specific texts which resonate with my work I am interested in the way in which  Music is repetitive and I am exploiting parallels between the  repetition in my  drawings in order to make connections between processes across different art forms.

The lines originate from daily drawings of the subtle change in colour delineating the point at which sea and sky meet, horizon lines which gradually developed their own autonomy as they became more and more vertical. I have called this group of works De Profundis: the Nocturnes leading from light into darkness or from darkness into light, connections which are not intended to be despairing but rather hopeful in the way that deeply sonorous powerful music can lift the spirit.