Family Portrait

family portrait

I tend to work big. Things that are 5'x5' seem small in the studio, but in the rest of the world they are too large to fit into galleries and living rooms. So what you see here are my whispers. In those moments when I stop shouting and splashing around in colour I peer through keyholes into myself and try to break open the little locked places in my subconscious.

Here I've taken from a series that I've titled "Family Portrait". Not the mother who raised me or the brother who used to pull my hair, but rather different parts of me I have extracted and pinned down onto paper. Here is the dysfunctional child and the whimsical one, the domineering parent, the benevolent lover. Here are my internal landscapes - the places I go when lost in confusion or searching for peace. Here are secrets.

It feels a bit exhibitionist to be displaying such intimate parts of myself for you, but I believe that we all must familiarize ourselves with our own schizophrenic menageries in order to get over this prudish shame we have in regards to our inner selves. Finally becoming comfortable with our physical intimate parts through years of exposure we must begin to look deeper. With the tangible conquered the intangible must be explored so we can come to the realization that every one of us is confused and pained and pensive and curious.

I invite you to be the voyeur, to watch as I map myself. If you need to have a wild child for yourself I'll let my daughter-self visit; if you need peace I’ll let you lie by my sea.