The Usual Suspects
Scream bubbles.
Googly eyes.
A few hundred of the eight billion genies.
Red-and-white polka dots, a passing nod to Kusama’s endless orbs.
Infinity funfetti.
Blips.
Weird fishes.
Star trails.
They are tiny, improbable creatures. The usual suspects. Their names haven’t been invented yet.
These are, a few of my favourite things.
Some of these wee heroes have drifted into my art uninvited, and then they have refused to leave. They have migrated from one painting to another, quietly evolved, as the landscapes around them have continually mutated. Some of these little thingamajigs have been with me for years. While others have made their presence known unexpectedly, stayed for a bit, and vanished just as quietly as they first emerged.
I think of them as recurring field specimens, small visual companions that make repeat appearances throughout my work. They aren’t symbols in any fixed sense, nor are they meant to be decoded. Instead, they are fragments of delight, echoes of childhood curiosity, biology lab nostalgia, late night doodles, science fiction daydreams and other odd things that have caught my attention in my enchanted everydays.
Whenever I begin a new painting, I rarely know which of these little inhabitants will appear in my work. They are the small absurdities that keep my worlds from taking themselves too seriously. Rarely the protagonists, yet impossible to ignore, they linger in the background as quiet reminders that enchantment is always close by, usually hiding in the smallest details, waiting for anyone willing to look a little closer.
More Field Notes
- Navigating the Field Guide
- On Frogs, Hot Springs & Dangerous Illusions
- A walk through Cool Creek Park
- When is an artwork complete?
- Cartographies Of Mischief
- Everybody’s Elsewhere