Portfolio

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For me - the line is representative of my identity: the journeys, directions and paths I have taken and the infinite possibilities of those that lie ahead. These are works using silk screen printed papers - collaged with different tapes - produced with not too much preplanning - just going with the flow and allowing the composition to come together in the process...

There has always been some mystique around the alchemy of oil painting.  It is messy but can achieve subtle and bold results. It is in fact an easy medium to use  - you just have to throw yourself into it and have plenty of rags to hand - as "mistakes" can be easily wiped away! It is hugely flexible in terms of mark making and opacity.  Yes you have to have patience and let the paint dry - but for me it is an important medium to slow down to -  allowing a real connection with mixing hues on the palette and being absorbed in the mark making.  It is a way of being immersed in repetitive actions - almost spiritual - responding to the paint and colours - allowing work to emerge from the process of making. 

   (@ollieharrop) 

Landscapes of the Mind: R-L - Then, Now, After

Gesso, caulk, tape, mat domestic paint, varnish on aluminium

730x730mm

Exploration of my own identity using surrealists techniques, outside rules about allowing work to emerge rather than the outcome being entirely within my control, embracing the spiritual in art (the meditative quality of repetition) and the significance of materials (here domestic paint & decorating materials) as a nod to my own background.  After - is a map of my journeys to school (where I used to collect little abandoned characters and anything shiny), Now -  is "pulse" representation in graph form of the different stages of my life, After - the lines representing the possible futures open to me.

During lockdown I found being amongst trees (& forest bathing) essential ways to stay sane and connected to something much bigger than the four walls. A tree from wimbledon common, my rendition of it using brown paper and then obliterating the background. I fell in love with the Acer in my garden and tried to capture the beauty of its leaves and bark (ink overpainted in bleach).

Experiments using different colour combinations (above centre) laying down washi tape in accordance with the Japanese (Seigensha) Dictionary of Colour, displacement of lines & shapes and the spectrum (top right): collage using recycled magazine paper.

My work exploring, shape, scale, texture, mixed media, tiles & glazes.

Explorations of otherness through "masks" as a metaphor for identity, a shield (to hide behind or to change appearance: using my own image, repeat monoprints, japanese kitsune masks and experiments with hydro-dipping  - as a  way of reimagining objects.

A project looking at the high suicide rates in Japan - with many root causes: loneliness, economics, overwork, honour, copycat, familial, group suicide... (there are over 15 words & terms for suicide in the japanese language). I focussed on The Jukai Forest (Sea of Trees) at the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro - which since the 1960's has become one of the world's most used suicide sites after being associated with a novel by Matsumoto ('Tower of Waves') - but the forest has an ancient connection to death - as the home of the Yurei - ghosts of the dead and as a place where ubasute (senicide) was practiced: the elderly were left to die in order to relieve the economic burden on the family. 

It's been a bit weird hasn't it? Lockdown and recent events has made me see thing very differently. Some of my escapes: the model of a cell, and of a scene from Metropolis, an appropriation of an old classic for new gods, a surreal landscape as home for some of my models and the next stop is.....

Coming soon.

Coming soon.

Coming soon.