A reverentially lit pseudo-diptych, this binary altar depicts a dialectic between coronal entities. Cleaved into two contrasting colour fields the lower of which occupies a marginal majority of the canvas.
The upper field presents three concentric discs nestled on a bed of orange washes. The central aperture of dense cerise seeks to dominate but is held in constraint by the ring of indigo. Outside of that is an orbit of yellow that is more consonant with the background. It is painted in blocks like bricks or petals and clipped at its northern cardinal point. It represents the event horizon with vulnerability. The white of the canvas bleeds through at the periphery and at the sub-field boundaries.
Each ring has its own suggestions of emotion: surprise, tension, release. But together they create a funnel of feeling locking the viewer into a coerced contemplation. Its gilded abstraction pregnant with a transmutation to the figurative.
The lower field acts as the retinal afterimage of the upper. It acts as its analogue, memory, and witness. The colour variation is far subtler with close inspection required to discern the exact delineation. Whilst the repetition evokes recognition there is also uncertainty and enigmatic concealment. But its also more cerebral and equanimous. Apollonian if we grant Dionysus resides above it.
As the eye flicks back and forth between each quadrant the lower circles appear to glow brighter. The title refers only to orange and white as if the minority hues are reflections of the ocular whose gaze alights upon it. A mirror to both itself and the viewer: The solar transposed to the lunar.
[He], drew a circle with a piece of red chalk and said:
"When men, even unknowingly, are to meet one day,
whatever may befall each, whatever the diverging paths,
on the said day,
they will inevitably come together
in the red circle."
Jean-Pierre Melville
Epigraph to Le Cercle Rouge (1970)
Part of a group exhibition 'august (adj)' at Flowers Gallery Cork Street from 7 to 30 Aug 2025.
