macro & micro

It’s funny how you have to enter a particular frame of mind to be able to paint… for me, the process starts with detailed drawings based on zooms of nature; doing nothing also figures quite highly too, well, physically doing nothing and thinking and reflecting on what I intend to do with the paint. This building-up stage can take weeks, it could be viewed as procrastination, but for me it’s all part of the process. It’s definitely not waiting for inspiration, more a ritual.

Last week I started the drawings, a series based on clumps of grass growing on a red-earth hill. Then I projected them onto canvases 120 x 120cm, four of them. I dedicated a lot of time to creating the images even though I know that these initial stages may be totally eradicated by the process of painting, but that doesn’t matter to me; these initial drawing phases are important to prepare me mentally for what is to follow.

This week I’ve been creating textures with PVA and gesso primer on the canvases with what started life as a paint brush but now resembles a stick. This painstaking process may also be obliterated when the real creativity with paint starts. When these textures are dry I’ll start rubbing and dripping paint – if it works, great, but usually the painting has something else in mind and the painting’s direction will have to change. I do have an end image in mind, but the exciting thing is that I don’t really know what will happen.

If I just started throwing paint around, the lack of direction and mental focus would be missing and the end result may reflect that. Sometimes though I do paint with no intention or idea of what I want to happen… making those images work is a nightmare. Maybe making these paintings work will also be a nightmare, losing sight of that initial idea may actually help though.

Making videos is linked to this process – but obviously is not as messy. I’m having a little break from starting any new ones, but not from screenings. My new video ‘St Louis. Path 1’ was screened at Better Bankside in London last Friday by Ottica TV and this Friday that video plus another at Grimsby Minster organised by Grimsby Institute entitled: Lightworks.

I drove to Agen on Saturday to view the space for my show which starts in July – and very nice it is too. It’s in a museum dedicated to the work of Gertrude Shoen, a sculptor who gave many of her pieces to the mairie. Apparently she’s quite well known, but never really made it – her initiative means her work will at least make a mark locally, be seen and live on.

What a great idea – why should work be hidden away, never to be seen?

Coincidently, I just stumbled across the work I donated to Douai Abbey on the internet… I just did a google search for Jonathan Moss to see which of my images came up first and those pictures appeared. I’ve not seen them hung yet, so it was a nice surprise to see photos of them in-situ. They are in a corridor that leads from the monastery to the library – so will only be viewed by the monks, which adds a level of quietude and intimacy that would rarely be found in a public place.

I now really need to focus on the new series of paintings I started before Christmas; life has been hectic though as I shall soon be the proud owner of a garret in the centre of Perpignan (it comes with an apartment underneath!), strangely next door to the school of art. Hopefully it will give us access to a little bit of culture every now and then which we miss living up our mountain.