ARTIST STATEMENT When I began working on this series my thoughts were occupied by the effects of serious illness on the lives of people I knew. Conditions such as cancer invade and destroy bodily tissue, yet research using electron microscopy reveals they have stunning visual forms. I named the first painting ‘Beautiful Seeds of Destruction’ to show that something with a beautiful appearance can result in physical and emotional devastation. My way of sorting out my thoughts and feelings about life is through artistic practise. Working on the first painting made me think about how disease can lie hidden within a body and then suddenly strike and spread quickly with devastating effects on human life. I decided to incorporate a visual representation of disease inside my paintings in the same way that illness is contained within a body. My intention was to explore the impact of what is concealed within. The exception is the first painting, which is an image representing cancer cells. The other works in the series contain forms depicting disease or decay embedded in the composition. I thought to visually contrast the forms of disease with the appearance of human life, represented by many abstract portraits using my Turkish Whirling technique. I appropriated the name ‘Beautiful Seeds of Destruction’ for the series, as a metaphor for concealed sickness within human society. I have personally witnessed how deeply embedded attitudes and behaviours within a culture have the potential to grow and spread like a disease. Destructive forces, previously suppressed or concealed, can suddenly flare up in response to events and spread like infections in ways that create social and cultural devastation, causing breakdown in human society.