The way meaning arises.
Painting skeletons came after a couple of incidents; one arose in a painting around 6 months previous, it was just there within a shadow I was painting so I let it happen. That painting ultimately remains unfinished but the image was brewing. It came to the fore after some sad news in my personal life. I wasn’t consciously thinking of death but they were all I could manage to paint while dealing with my emotional state. Of course they say death to the viewer, but I find them a little amusing too. This could be construed as a representation of my personality, my darks are quite dark but often tinged with hilarity and ridiculousness.
I heard a talk about meditation and joining the stream of consciousness, and these skeletons sprung to mind. As I have failed to get to the shore of enlightenment, am I left flailing in the stream forever?
Of course I love swimming in the sea, and its darkness and danger is such inspiration. I like being confronted by its mystery, power, tales of shipwreck and 80 feet waves, thinking about what it holds that we don’t know about, unfathomable depths, parts unexplored, exploited and industrialised. Is all this represented by a skeleton? It could be.
You see I don’t really know what they’re ‘about’.