As a continued route of investigation from my artwork Emerge in the Stour Valley Arts exhibition in Ashford (see below), I took a white ‘plaster of Paris‘ cube into the forest and took photographs of it in different forest environments and using the composing mechanism of photography as a tool for exploring contrast.
This process has opened up questions into the use of the phenomena of contrast: the logical, pure, sterile, human shape of the white cube and the connotations associated with it, in relation to the seemingly chaotic and rich, fertile forest environment.
This action seems to feel like I’m investigating my own relationship with the forest; the cube represents me, trying to position and immerse myself…
Or perhaps it is a comment in response to my perception of the sensation of contemporary culture within the natural environment?
“I believe that language and imagination, far from alienating us from nature, are our most powerful and natural tools for re-engaging with it. […] Culture isn’t the opposite or contrary of nature. It’s the interface between us and the non-human world, our species’ semi-permeable membrane.” Richard Mabey, Nature Cures pp.23
Sleeping on the forest ground.
Ant kingdom and cube.
“But it was regaining that imaginative relationship with the world beyond that was my ‘nature cure’.” Richard Mabey, Nature Cure, pp.64
Void
The white cube’s final resting place…watch this space…
