And Repeat to Fade

The Chapel in Caroline Gardens was built in 1826 and was in use as a church until it was bombed in 1944. The building was abandoned and left without a roof to the ravages of the English weather for 20 years. In the 60’s it was given a roof and boarded up thus preserving from further deterioration but also holding still in time the history of the place. I have been photographing, painting and responding to the walls inside the chapel on and off over the past 5 years - And Repeat to Fade is an ever evolving part of these investigations.

This installation is a collage of the many surfaces and textures of sections of the distressed walls in Caroline Gardens Chapel. Painted canvas, plasterboard, found acrylic sheets, photographs printed on paper, vinyl and wooden boards are layered over one another. Many individual compositions are bought together and displayed in a central cluster, exploding and fracturing outwards. Layered textured surfaces showing degradation and the passing of time explore our emotional connection to places of shared memory, and the atmosphere created by this hidden and revealed history. The works also become a record of the time that has eroded these surfaces and reveal the domestic, un-fantastic banality of everyday existence. There is a poetic profundity to this erosion which speaks of metaphor and loss.