‘This prior knowing of ourselves
Which brings me to this point of knowing
This silent navigator sounding depths through time
Sometimes when I listen
I can hear the story of everything
Which opens to the vista of the world
So sing it, sing it & release it
Coded spelled and burning fast’
RW
These are collages of antique textile, chalk, ink and paper
I call them painting with words inspired by place, word and memory
‘Sometimes it’s like walking around yourself
Take a step out towards space
Leaving the known and the learned
Dropping off the baggage of the past
To take a step and then another
And as you go you get a little lighter
In spirit and being
Until in fact it’s a dance of atoms
In space and time
And no known you ever was of could have been’
RW
These are collages of antique textile, pigment, paint and ink where I make the canvas to paint on. Each one is different and unique and an interpretation of the text.
I call them Painting with Words.
These collages were inspired by a month’s travel to Japan to study Zen calligraphy with the lay monks of the ‘Hitsuzenkai’. 2 weeks were spent in Tokyo and 2 in Kyoto — they incorporate antique textile kimono and the brush calligraphy scrolls that were brushed whilst I was studying there.
Poem by Rengetsu — Buddhist Zen Nun
‘I feel the scattering blossoms
have taken away with them
my attachments,
and the stream sounds fresh
as summer approaches’
Bill Nighy Recording
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Sensory Journey — Arts for Health commission — Queen Marys Hospital, Roehampton
I wrote these words in response to this commission. You, the viewer are invited on a journey, a sensory journey. The beginning and end are interpreted by a white untarnished canvas. The words run through the six panels in brush calligraphy. They inspired the mood and feeling of the series. The ward names, Rose, Sandalwood, Laurel and Lavender were chosen by staff at the hospital and these have been interpreted on different panels by the use of colour. The colour used is pigment which is applied in a painterly way onto the canvas. The paper leaves feature copies of original antique watercolours researched at the Herbarium at Kew Gardens and each canvas bears the apothecary’s mark of a bottle. The canvas is formed by a collage technique incorporating fabric and Japanese paper which then becomes the surface to write, paint and stitch.
‘My breath is the wind that fills thee.
Light that would burn a thousand suns or cool a thousand moons.
Gentle vapours on whose current is the earth penetrated —
And space so huge that even the heavens were lifted.’
Bill Nighy Recording
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This series of collages is simply inspired by an inner sense of freedom. They are a collage of paper, oil paint and black ink on antique textile
‘Him one should know as pure and immortal.
Him one should know as pure and immortal.’
The Upanishads
Bill Nighy Recording
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This collection was made for an exhibition in Zurich in May 2012. Please contact me if you would like to see the entire series.
Listening Paintings 2012
A collage of antique textile, paper, oil pastel.
The text which inspired this series is from the Bhaghavad Gita.
‘Through the inner ear of a devotee I make my way into his soul and sweep it clean.