The nature of my work
Recently I’ve been working on a series of works in drawing, photography and film. I’ve named this project “the island”.
‘A deserted tropical island. A setting which is utopian. The idea of paradise on earth is one that originates back to the Bible; the Garden of Eden before the fall of men.
Paradise islands are highly desirable places. But does paradise exist ? How can we know that paradise on earth is not a fantasy, but reality ?’
These works question the idea of paradise, innocence and utopia.
In the video, the photographs and the series of large scale charcoal drawings on canvas we see a body of work inspired by childhood fantasies of uninhabited tropical islands, adventure films and the disillusion of adulthood. Apparent paradise and dystopia. Beauty and decay. Tropicalia. What's fake and what's real.
Video ‘The island’ (in progress)
A combination of shots from an unihabited paradisical island in Singapore, audio from the 1980’s movie “the Blue Lagoon” and texts from William Golding’s novel “Lord of the flies” this video work leads you from ‘paradise found’ into ‘paradise lost’. The audio, the texts, the imagery merge into one as we find ourselves slowly shifting from utopia into dystopia.
“The history of utopian attempt is the history of failure.”
I draw inspiration from personal experiences, different cultures, anthropology, mythology, film, literature, philosophy and photography.
‘A deserted tropical island. A setting which is utopian. The idea of paradise on earth is one that originates back to the Bible; the Garden of Eden before the fall of men.
Paradise islands are highly desirable places. But does paradise exist ? How can we know that paradise on earth is not a fantasy, but reality ?’
These works question the idea of paradise, innocence and utopia.
In the video, the photographs and the series of large scale charcoal drawings on canvas we see a body of work inspired by childhood fantasies of uninhabited tropical islands, adventure films and the disillusion of adulthood. Apparent paradise and dystopia. Beauty and decay. Tropicalia. What's fake and what's real.
Video ‘The island’ (in progress)
A combination of shots from an unihabited paradisical island in Singapore, audio from the 1980’s movie “the Blue Lagoon” and texts from William Golding’s novel “Lord of the flies” this video work leads you from ‘paradise found’ into ‘paradise lost’. The audio, the texts, the imagery merge into one as we find ourselves slowly shifting from utopia into dystopia.
“The history of utopian attempt is the history of failure.”
I draw inspiration from personal experiences, different cultures, anthropology, mythology, film, literature, philosophy and photography.