abstraction

RIVER DEEP

Acrylic, charcoal and paper on cradled panel, 76 x 76 x 2 cm, 2022.

I’d been writing a poem in an online workshop that ended up being about the watermill on the river Tas, in the village I lived in as a child. We used to catch minnows and sticklebacks in the gravel shallows of the leat, and paddle through the culvert tunnels. The mill waterwheels had gone, but the river went down through the tail race in a scary fast oily way, through the metal bars, and under the wooden building of the mill. From inside you could see the water, and the road through the loose boards. This painting references all that, with words carved into the paint.

ORANGE LIKE A LEAF THAT HAS FALLEN, PINK LIKE CHERRY BLOSSOM, LIKE A SWEET OFFERING, LIKE RASHES AND RASPBERRIES, LIKE UNFOLDED, FALLEN CHERRY LEAVES

Acrylic on deep-sided collaged canvas, 100 x 100 x 4 cm, 2021

I picked up two fallen cherry leaves, one pink-red, the other orange, and this painting echoes both the idea of cherry blossom and the fallen leaves.