: : :  <<<-------<   Black   <-----------------((o))----------------->  Arrows   >------->>>  : : :

This painting work was realised during the first lockdown in London, spring of 2020. 

Having made a sketch with the seed of an idea a few years ago, I knew that at the right time it would come to life as a big scale work. Considering the theme and the intention behind the idea in the first place, it was an apt thing to focus on in a time of general confusion in the world and in my world, when turning inward and finding guidance within using any and every tool available was most important. And still is. 

Acknowledging my strong urge for escapism, making this piece was an effort to transmute it…  

into a self-orienting force within me, a compass of sorts within this ever-shifting, uncertain and questionable reality. Knowing full well that adaptability is paramount, yet sorely lacking concrete external guidance, I fixated on creating or “invoking” if you will, my own spirit guide in the form of the creature you see looking back at you with its one great eye in the painting. 

Both during and after painting it, I would sit in front of it in meditation, engaging in a process of active imagination (term used and practice emphasised in Jungian psychology and a naturally occurring human tendency) letting it churn out the contents of my own unconscious, through the infolding of imaginary narratives involving this character, of traveling between other realms and “layers of reality”. 

As a subsequent processing this information would follow and based on the principle of phenomenology I would draw from it whatever “guidance” I would intuit. 

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[ Scroll down for the works to the spoken poetry in the film ]

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Mixed Media:  Graphite, Fresh charcoal from palo santo sticks used whilst still hot, copper and iron fillings, apple cider mineral for oxidation process, hairspray for fixing, black emulsion applied with bird feathers, and oil paints on canvas,  primed with PVA & water mixture through the process as required. Approx size h:155 cm, w:150cm

You can purchase prints of the finished work (A4, A3, A2)  through my ETSY shop! : 

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The original will also be for sale in the future so feel free to email if interested! 

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