I love walking into the studio each morning – chalky sticks of soft pastel lined up in rows of grouped and gradated colours. The idea of holding raw pigment and applying it directly makes sense to me. For the most part, painting is a joyful process. From the first lines to building up areas of colour into solid and then scratchy, textured layers to define contours that describe the tensions and gestures between forms.
The Pastels
The figurative paintings are a contemplation of our relationships and connection to each other. Using everyday scenes that are part observation part memory and sometimes imagination. Depicting the ease of old friends sprawled on beach towels, or the formality of acquaintances on a park bench. The dogs are a further expression of this with their own language and interaction between themselves and their humans.
A recurring theme is the interior world – probably the result of moving house four times in the last seven years and the need to set up home quickly in order to create a refuge. Although this work is not figurative there is evidence of the human touch. Two stripy mugs on a gate leg table are all that remain of a conversation, or two red plastic chairs nudged aside after their occupants have got up and left. It’s about private worlds and painting the unsaid, a present narrative of what has just been.
The Prints
I have recently returned to printing - in particular, working on a combination of etching and monotype. Matisse said, 'My line drawing is the purest and most direct translation of my emotion' and I like the idea of committing a line to the permanence of the metal plate. The print studio provides a different work environment and with it a different rhythm of working. Perhaps the more public space lends itself to producing more private images: momentary poses of boys lost in their own reverie or running towards the sea with the summer stretched out ahead of them.
Whether printing or painting – it all comes down to observation, an equivalent of a visual diary. I draw and paint what surrounds me and what I love. I seek to capture the impact of excitement and emotion that first made me stop and take note.
Angela A'Court 2010