My paintings document the experiences of today’s youth culture and explore the visual dynamics of contemporary social situations.
As a child I loved the exercise of inventing stories based on reproductions of paintings; I am replicating this exercise even now; the subjects I choose are interacting in ambiguous ways, and it is up to the viewer to speculate at what is happening.
I am inspired by un-posed photographic resources, particularly the photographs up-loaded onto social networking sites. They provide an unique insight into our society, and by having no personal acquaintance with the subjects, the undefined nature of their relationships are as much of a mystery to me as to my audience.
My influences are contemporary, but my method of execution is traditional. I assemble the canvases myself, which I then stretch with the highest quality linen and size with rabbit skin glue. The images are transferred using a hand-drawn grid, enabling me to better connect with and understand all the components of the image. The grid is then slowly obscured by layers of oil paint. I believe the careful selection and execution of materials lends itself, perhaps imperceptibly, to the pictorial weight of the final piece.
Viewers of my work are always interested in how I go about the process of choosing images from the vast array available: I often search through thousands of photographs, picking just one. By transforming them into paintings I am bestowing importance upon them, so careful selection is vital. Compositional strength is important, but so is selecting images that can be improved in some way; if they are too perfect then this leaves little room for a creative response.
Ultimately, however, I am looking for an indefinable quality, perhaps best described by Baudelaire when he wrote that ‘Each age has a deportment, a glance and a smile of its own.' I am looking for images that convey something of the essence of the now.
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