If you have never been to a 1st Thursday I thoroughly recommend you give it a go. It’ s free and is held every first Thursday of each month. My tour started at Whitechapel Gallery, picked up a map of all the galleries around Brick Lane. I dropped into several galleries but the two mentioned below left the biggest impression on me. The first stop was Gallery SO where an exhibition of Simone Ten Hompel ‘s precious metal pieces. I felt drawn to his explanation of his work “traces have a notion of someone having been there. Traces convey memory…” which I thought could equally apply to painting as a painter leaves brush marks that capture how the marks were made and the movements made holding the brush.
I came across an artist on a recent trip to London called Karina Vettorel and a moving pieces of her work called The Closed Hearts which she describes as being made during an emotional moment of her life and represents her own closed and wounded heart.
Karina Vettorel, 2015, The Closed Hearts #1, Oil on Canvas, Size (H x W x D): 63 x 49.5 x 4 cm. Image taken from her website at:-
I was drawn to these two pieces and thought that my work was similar in the covering and layering process.
Reflecting on her comments about why she made the work does make me think that perhaps I am exploring the covering and uncovering in my work as a way to test my abilities to express how I feel about myself through the art that I make. I certainly question why I feel compelled to explore and make the work that I do.
