Working wet on wet, I paint watery faces that bleed and leach. Mostly in Indian ink but I have allowed myself a little juice-tinted colour here. I am interested in not knowing quite how the ink or paint is going to land on 

the paper or where it is going to end up. There is some control, but ultimately my brakes have broken and I am careering along until my brush is dry. 

 

Inspired by the provocative and unconventional portraiture of Marlene 

Dumas and her empathetic attitude towards her subject. Her works are as 

heavy as coal sacks, yet she paints with a rare tenderness and sensibility. This is reflected in the notes of Dumas's book Sweet Nothings, where she uses her own unique voice in the form of poetry, aiding the viewer in 

deciphering her take on the human condition. 

 

The human face recurs regularly in my work and reading Lacan's The Mirror Stage, he describes the 'birth of the subject'. This is when a child first sees itself as 'I'. This is a poignant development in my process and how the idea of identity from my own childhood and subsequent adulthood, has been shaped by significant others. To be investigated further.........

 

I have named this series Bruised….each face belongs to a human punch-bag, a masochist, a gimp or a fetishist. The faces are sorrowful childlike 

adults with eyes behind eyes, implying a before and after event. The eyes of 

victims, purportrators and the deceased have been poked out, melted, blackened or blinded.