Return II 2016

Detail of "Return II"

"Return II"

My love affair with paper and eco-dying continues with this work furthering the exploration of my connection to my geographical environment as it supplies my physical reality with the essentials for life. The physical world is created in layers, strata, deposits  and in this work I have been overlaying transparent papers with plant pigment deposits on in a technique like painterly wash layers. This way the pigments have built up in different densities and textures across the underlying surface of the work. Superimposed and imbedded into these layers are the skeletal leaves. I have collected, cleaned, dried and pressed these remnants of life's passage from my surrounding physical environment.  They feed the layers below as in the past the layers below fed their growth form. The cycle of life continues with their return. 

"Return I" 2016

Overview of "Return I"

Detail

Detail

I have a long term delight in the transfer of natural pigment onto papers, fabrics and yarns, by slow methods.  My fascination with the cycles of life and the richness of my geographical location are combined in this series "Return" which uses these dyed materials. I think of the layering of the pigmented filmy tissue papers  and various fabrics as evocative of the painterly method of building layers of colour washes, creating depths in the colour. For me this aligns with natural layering processes where sediments are geologically deposited and then overlaid with finer detritus and plant matter, creating our "earth" - our place in the cosmos. There are no two iterations that are the same, ingredients always subtly altering over space and time. Nothing is geometric or regular, there is a creative organic shape to the outcome of the process. This is what I strive to reference with this series of works.