Mid-Summer Fall I

his painting was a long time in process, inspired by the abstracts of Gerhard Richter. However, I wished to create a piece with transparency and transitions that the viewer can enter and luxuriate in.

It was begun in acrylics and completed with oil paint using squeegees and silicone painting tools throughout. At first I made a mostly blue abstract composition with different tones and strengths of cool colour. After a long, hot day as the evening cool descended I went into the work again adding oil paint; rich yellows, turquoise and blues. This new strength of texture and colour developed into a clear vertical quality, in the next days I worked into the piece with magenta glazes creating the warm reds and cooling violets. This glazing created wonderful spatial qualities and a warm atmosphere tempered by cool violets and blues

This artwork works on different levels - the upper section is more active and contrasting, the middle is quiet and calm, with the mauve pyramid shapes and diamonds of red echoing the movements above but slowing them down and bringing an ‘opening out’ quality, and the base area supports these higher movements with an energetic vertical streaming. The warm reds radiate outwards but are held by the violets and blues creating a gentle breathing quality and a balance in the centre. I would like the viewer to experience and feel this balance within themselves when they experience the artwork.