Because Black

This collection is literally and metaphorically a series of photographs in which an inability to fully illuminate a given subject is expressed.  An admission that the viewer’s own imagination is respected and required.  

We feel as though we’re given too much data. 

As a visual artist looking for sanctuary from the endless onslaught of information I started to see the colour black in photography as a metaphor for the space I felt I needed. 

A place unreachable and calm where data has no register. A place where there are no answers because there are no questions.  

Transcendental. 

I don’t want to fill up every last space with detail. I like not spiralling out of control to the edges of the picture plane.

We naturally want to hide from the noise. ‘Caution! Vehicle reversing’ from the street outside;  I’m at my kitchen table but caution is subtly triggered. Thousands upon thousands of ‘space-invaders’ every day. On line and on our nerves. 

So I find myself wanting to share ‘nothing’. As a way of respecting my own privacy but also as a gift. I can’t find a better way to do this as a visual artist than to drape my artworks in lots and lots of quiet, still, depthless, photographic black.

Every pixel is as alive as those forming the most intricate of details.

A social media mutiny, undemonstrative and mine.

Withholding for the sake of silence.

This ‘emptiness’ is replete.

A private and dignified quiet.

Some peace.