Part 1 - Elementary insights of a contemporary portrait artist and photographer
I have just returned from a research trip, videoing and photographing the spectacular Niagra Falls for a new series which will focus on water and its symbolism.
I have always been fascinated by water. In all ancient cultures, water is the symbolic representation of spirit and emotion. As an artist, that gives me huge scope for creative interpretation.
Plato said: “as a man thinketh, so is he” – suggesting that we are what we think. Thoughts and feelings have such immense power. But we often mistake states of mind as the reality, and wrongly suppose that we have no control over them.
My painting The Deluge represents a washing away of fear and destruction, which are all states of mind. The water dissolves the barriers and restrictions of old belief systems, acting as a cleansing force. However, it doesn’t destroy the essence of those beliefs, upon which we can recycle our creativity and build anew.
The Deluge: Mixed Media, Oil paint and photographic print on canvas 11.6 feet x 6 feet
Science and quantum physics are discovering that water actually has consciousness.
Dr. Emoto ran an experiment where he took water from a common source, divided it into five separate containers then he attached a different word to each individual vial and consequently the molecular structure of each changed to reflect the essence of the word that was affixed to its container.
He discovered that water takes on the molecular structure of any energy (or emotion) that you project upon it. What I try to show in my art is the dynamic between water and thought, mental and emotional: water is the intuition that is being corrupted by too much left brain rational thinking.
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