URBAN AND RURAL LANDSCAPES – GALLERY 2
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Distressed Surfaces

These paintings are intended to explore the distressed surfaces of urban decay where rust, rot, corrosion and neglect combine, according to their properties, in reaction to the external forces of nature.

The materials that build our towns and cities, blemished and scarred by sun and rain, provide us with an entire landscape of tactility – an ignored landscape of chance and accident where the formal qualities of line, colour, surface and texture converge, collaborate and mutate.

An unseen universe of microscopic beauty, marked by pollution and time, which on closer inspection may reveal something approaching the exquisite within the ordinary.  The cracks of blistering paint and flaking concrete create an intricate web of lines which weave their way across surfaces with the complexity of a street map revealing tensions under the surface, suggesting both frailty and vulnerability.

The vivid hues of rusting metal which so closely resemble the reds and yellows of Autumn provoke irresistible parallels with our own condition. Exposure to the sun causes our skin to age prematurely, dampness gets into our joints and the passing of time will leave its indelible traces.   

As impressionable beings, susceptible to external influences, there are further consequences for us, beyond the physical, which exist below the surface.  Psychologically we are the sum total of our experience, our inner world is shaped and formed by the outer world and we cannot undo that which has been done.  These worlds co-exist and are locked in permanent duality, any attempt to separate them would be like deleting the shadow from the object that is casting it.  For every action there must be a reaction and events, or rather our perception of them will significantly impact on us.

These paintings are intended as a potential metaphor for the Human experience.

Mike Coleman