2010 to 2021 - Unpublished experiments

2010 to 2021 - Unpublished experiments

1990 - 2010

My early works I described as being created in and derived from a unique system of geometric meter. This is the meter of visual composition as opposed to the meter found in poetry although the formalising and ordering property is the same. This meter, derived from particular and distinct geometry, provides a grammar and the actual fabric of my visual language.

The rudimentary beginnings of my work were developed 25 years ago, principally with a compass, rule and calculator. Motifs were developed out of simple geometric relationships, these being a visual, almost diagrammatic, expression of what I found geometrically pure and wondrously correct within the geometry itself. I don't claim these early investigations have any mathematical value, nor with the very first experiments any artistic merit. Yet through years of trial and error and a stubborn belief in this method as a pivotal means of creating art I formed the foundations of the work I continue today.

In this my first experiment deriving art directly from geometry I was thinking about artistic language very formally and I hit on an idea of using geometry to structure and meter an experiment to generate a particular visual dynamic. Central to this dynamic was the problem of, how to describe spherical or ovoid form on a two-dimensional surface. This problem was of great significance to many artist in the past including Michelangelo and Cézanne and was a key force in the evolution of their painted and drawn languages. I was also interested in how the balance of an abstract image was affected when it was turned up side down. Or to put it enough way: how does the force of gravity effect the visual balance of nature and does this relate to the visual balance of an abstract image with no symbolic reference to an up or down? These very formal concerns combined with an intuitive affinity with geometry germinated the seeds for the work I am producing today.