This series of paintings is based on regular pillars, or pylons, leading out to an island that is cut off at high tide. The concrete pylons once formed Second World War defences near where I grew up in Scotland and have been battered and broken over the years and now serve no purpose.
The term ‘pylon’ acts as a reference to various ideas. Pylons, in architectural terms, form the gateway to Egyptian temples associated with rebirth, and in engineering terms relate to pillars supporting either bridges or electricity cables. However in Cramond, where the pylons are located, they were created as a barrier to prevent U-boats travelling up the Firth of Forth and therefore become something that disconnects and separates.
One of the inspirations for this series was finding out about an annual punk festival that occurs on the island called Cramond Island of Punk. At low tide participants cross to the island and willfully get stranded as the tide goes up. Once they are disconnected from the mainland the old World War Two bunkers become impromptu stages. I liked the idea of people cutting themselves off on purpose from the mainland, traditional society, convention etc. That was the starting point for considering the pylons as a potential symbols for a gateway.
The paintings explore the juxtaposition of the manmade forms of the pylons and the organic forms of the drained shore. Although they could be considered landscapes, the paintings avoid any reference to human scale as a way of maintaining an element of abstraction and symbolism.
Further binaries are explored between the linear, geometric forms of the pylons and the non-linear, sinuous forms of the drained foreshore. The geometry of the pylons on the horizon become machine like, ordered, objective and calm. Whilst foreshortening of the shore and the heightened colour palette aim to suggest something more irrational and less knowable.
The term ‘pylon’ acts as a reference to various ideas. Pylons, in architectural terms, form the gateway to Egyptian temples associated with rebirth, and in engineering terms relate to pillars supporting either bridges or electricity cables. However in Cramond, where the pylons are located, they were created as a barrier to prevent U-boats travelling up the Firth of Forth and therefore become something that disconnects and separates.
One of the inspirations for this series was finding out about an annual punk festival that occurs on the island called Cramond Island of Punk. At low tide participants cross to the island and willfully get stranded as the tide goes up. Once they are disconnected from the mainland the old World War Two bunkers become impromptu stages. I liked the idea of people cutting themselves off on purpose from the mainland, traditional society, convention etc. That was the starting point for considering the pylons as a potential symbols for a gateway.
The paintings explore the juxtaposition of the manmade forms of the pylons and the organic forms of the drained shore. Although they could be considered landscapes, the paintings avoid any reference to human scale as a way of maintaining an element of abstraction and symbolism.
Further binaries are explored between the linear, geometric forms of the pylons and the non-linear, sinuous forms of the drained foreshore. The geometry of the pylons on the horizon become machine like, ordered, objective and calm. Whilst foreshortening of the shore and the heightened colour palette aim to suggest something more irrational and less knowable.