Page 7 - Essay Awakenings Reloaded by Paul McCloskey

adding further to the dimensional element of the paintings, as the idea of spirit
is that it is all things and all directions simultaneously. I attempt to reflect this

dichotomy by allowing the shapes and colours to interchange from solid
(enhanced by impasto layers) to atmospheric on the canvas surface. The
intention is to
bring all things

together, textural,
atmospheric,
dark, light and

gold causing a
tension and
cohesion forming

explosive

qualities that
Fig 4. Landscape with Violet. Triptych. Oil on Canvas. 183cm X 91cm
transcend the two
dimensional surface of the canvas. The emergence of the landscape bathed in

light, giving glimpses to its vast splendour and adds a mystical element to the

paintings. In places sky and earth are as one (Fig.1. 1a), evoking for me the
sense of personal growth, the sense of awakening to the beauty, divinity and

perfection, to the divine order
within all things. This suggestion
of heaven and earth in constant
struggle, merging yet separable,

solid yet amorphous all suggest the
dichotomy of the spiritual, the
beginning and the end, the alpha

and omega, the struggle within
between the conditioned self and
the divine/spiritual self. In fig 2 and

3 in particular the paint is layered Fig 4a. Landscape with Violet. Detail
with a pallet knife, but I have
emphasised the vortex of the landscape encouraging the viewer to focus

centrally, almost as a witness to the shifting landscape with the merging of sky
and earth. The thick layers of paint set against the darker flatter background
adds dimension.