ABOUTARTSHOPPRESSCONTACT Artist Statement Exhibit History Gallery Studio Buy Art Buy Prints

THE IMPERFECTION OF MEMORY

Human psychological stress and a path to healing.

ARTIST IN RESIDENCE June 14th-August 1st 2010
The Bird House Gallery, 99-101 Lark Lane, Liverpool.

With Forever changing surfaces eternal forms remain,
Waters flow with time, on human shores we do the same.
The tide and sediment of time are not of our consent,
The weathered surfaces of souls spoils not natures artisan intent.

I purposefully waited for a bleak venue before first showing this collection. What was important was highlighting the psychological dimensions of the paintings by creating an environment that mirrored the harshness and the loneliness of human stress. Our mental health in life determines our reality, modern life separates us from our instincts and passions and this undermines our mental strength. I wanted each painting to be a meditation on how our reality can change. At first the work seems distressed or despondent, but the work is as much about hope as it is about the meaningless condition.

Painting is a safe place, between worlds; the lines of flux represent the interaction between what is internal and external. It is an attempt to reconcile our duality as nature has. Sometimes the lines take on the form of a distorted halo, suggesting that is our potential to understand pain within ourselves and within others that makes us holy and our immortality is that which exists in all of us as an imperfect creature at the vanguard of a long evolutionary story. Art is a voice for the limitations and failings within our hearts, and therein lies its capacity to heal. There is a certain peace that exists in the acceptance of what we really are.

The meaningless condition itself is where your meaning lies, you will find your comfort in the very thing you fear.


Why am I like this.

Scrathcing around for the meaning of life in the cracks of natures labour.

There is no need to be afraid

Back to Joel Bird Gallery Art as representational aesthetics. The forms of nature and the language of humankind.

We are not machines, our weaknesses are both master and slave. Etched on our souls are the scars of our failings. Our capacity to heal owes much to the imperfection of memory.