The inspiration for my Abstract Carved Wood Series is taken from juxtaposition of the human world and the natural world. All my life when I look to nature, I see expressive faces hidden in the trees, rocks, stones, pebbles, waterfalls, rivers and clouds. My idea is that faces hidden in nature are a metaphor for the way humans hide their thoughts, feelings and motivations. In my art I join these two observations to show that many things in human society are obscured. I achieve this by concealing many abstract faces inside the colours and textures of my works in the same way that I see these faces hidden in nature. Many people do not see these hidden portraits in my paintings in the same way that they don’t see them in nature. I want to show that most people only notice superficial aspects of external reality and question why so many people do not perceive what is happening below the surface. Most people don’t recognise that much goes on in a secret dialogue, behind closed doors or beneath the veil. In my artworks I explore the reasons for this hiding from deeper reality. I question why people are content to sleepwalk through life, blind to what is happening around them. I want my paintings to help people wake up from the effects of social conditioning and brainwashing so that they can see what’s really going on in the world.
In 2013 I visited Australia and was very struck by the different types of forms I saw in the rocks. I took thousands of Art photographs of these abstract shapes. This visual experience inspired this abstract carved wood series.
