Tuscan Hillside 87cm x 107cm Charcoal on Paper NFS
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DRAWINGS
'Elgin' 'Warriors'
I am very grateful to the Greek and Roman Department at the British Museum which gave me permission to work in charcoal in their galleries and these drawings are among my interpretations of Pheidias' Elgin Marbles and the warriors in the Mausoleum of Halikarnassos (Room 21) which is kept extremely cold to preserve the delicate and beautiful pieces. The staff are only allowed to remain in the Halikarnassos room for short periods because of the cold and they were extremely considerate and took turns on duty thereby allowing me to complete my work albeit by the end of the process, with extremely cold hands!
Whilst sketching from the Elgin Marbles I became increasingly aware of the way Pheidias has depicted extreme violence in an almost balletic form. I was disturbed by this as we live in an era of 'spin' in which, for example, the death of civilians in war is described as 'collateral damage' - to me an unacceptable hijack of language designed to desensitise us to the consequences of war.
'Spin' is obviously an historical device to make war acceptable, so I decided to depict these young warriors as well trained killers caught up in the machinery of State during a war and the goddesses as culpable through their cold natures and cynical use of sexuality in their encouragement of violence in young men.
Drawing With Charcoal
Drawing with charcoal, I often spend many hours creating the surface on which I want to work before commencing the drawing itself. These surfaces are on various papers and I will often create a textured surface behind the paper I am working on to make marks that add an almost 3 dimensional sense to the final drawing.
The different types and different hardnesses of charcoal combined with the tremendous variety of papers and boards (in the case of Roseotypes® painted panel) mean that similar images can appear to be either radically or subtly, different.
The sounds of the different charcoals on the variety of surfaces also affects the way I feel both physically and emotionally which of course affects the final drawing both compositionally and atmospherically.
A Roseotype® is the result of an unique process I have developed for creating Charcoal drawings on specially prepared Wood, Panel or MDF. It has the curious visual property of endowing the finished Charcoal with unusual relief on a seemingly polished surface, giving the Roseotype® its characteristic metallic look. First I paint the material to create a textured surface on which I then apply layer after layer of a particular type of charcoal rubbing off each layer with either a cloth or my hands between each application of charcoal.
When satisfied with the surface which may take many days and many layers to perfect, I then draw the images you see using a different type of charcoal. As every mark shows, there is no margin for error on such an unforgiving surface so each mark has to be considered in advance and then made with confidence, 'every mark is a decision'.
I then apply a fixative several times and you may notice that the drawn charcoal appears to be suspended or even floating on the surface which is why I have them framed without glass – they are extremely fragile but their fragility needs to be directly observed.
I have never seen this technique and believe it is unique to me hence the name Roseotype® which has been approved by the UK Intellectual Property Office (The Patent Office) for registration as a Trade Mark to identify this distinctive process.
While I have created an extremely difficult and unforgiving process, making something so delicate and fragile on a surface which I coax into looking like a metal gives me great pleasure.Field & Fence, Field & Fence & Reeds and Field & Fence & Hay Bales are available as a collection for £2,400.
Please contact for purchase and commissioning information. Please note that the surface is extremely delicate and easily damaged.
