Disincarnated

Disincarnated grew out of a visit to the Saatchi Gallery in London on 22 April 2014.

I was there with a friend when something about the scene caught my attention. Her distinctive style of dress, the artwork behind her and the atmosphere of the gallery came together in a way that made me take out my phone and start photographing her. I certainly wasn’t looking for a painting at the time, but there was something about the moment that stayed with me long after the visit was over.

My friend’s style of dress was an art form in itself. The more I looked, the harder it became to separate her from the artwork around her. It wasn’t any single element that interested me, but the way everything worked together.

The painting grew out of a series of photographs taken that day, but it did not remain tied to them. My original intention was to produce a much more photorealistic work. Instead, the painting took me somewhere quite different.

Paint was repeatedly applied, scraped away, sanded back and reworked over a period of almost ten years. As the painting developed, I became less interested in reproducing the source material and more interested in responding to what had caught my attention in the first place. Gradually, the painting moved further away from the photographs until it found its own visual language.

Looking back, Disincarnated taught me an important lesson. Sometimes the concept determines the style rather than the other way round. The final painting emerged through a process of reworking and discovery rather than from a fixed plan.

I also designed and made the frame for this painting.