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lamentation four

canvas and mixed mediums

This piece began with the idea of loss, specifically loss of potential. That a possible outcome or future has been destroyed or removed from someone, not by choices they’ve made but by things done to them.

A canvas is one of the basic starting points in art, like a writer’s blank page. Here the canvas has been defaced with paint smeared across its surface. While this destruction could almost be unintentional, the tea stains, coffee stains and handprints reflect a deliberate human intervention. It was important to me that the piece reflect an element of human decision within its destruction. And tools and paint tubes have been left attached to the canvas, their removal now carrying the potential of further damage.

The slashes across the canvas are reminiscent of Lucio Fontana’s Spatial Concept ‘Waiting’. And like Fontana’s work there is a paradox at play; the destruction of the canvas has in itself created a new piece of art. This idea builds on the landing point of lamentation three, that the scars and marks on a jar make it unique. Reflecting on lamentation four this has stuck out to me and feels relevant that the real loss and destruction this art alludes to often creates our present. That is to say; I wouldn’t be me without the pain in my past, the lost opportunities, as well as the positives.

This is the fourth of six reflections on the lamentation pieces. I’ll be posting the final ones here over the next month. If you’d like to read them now, they’ve already been made available to my patreons here.