‘LIQUID SPACE’: a visual investigation of the sea as an empirical, experiential and metaphoric space

Abstract

Artworks produced in this studio-based research (option D) involve exploration of the ‘liquid space’ of the sea, not just in its physical and sensual nature and the way the sea looks, but also with what the sea inspires. They explore the spatial dynamics of underwater terrains, convergences of inner and outer ‘space’, and question if and how the numinous and immaterial might be made manifest in the material. References to the traditional story of Jonah and the Whale operate as a contemporary metaphor for the sea as a site of death and renewal. Through the creation of series of paintings, works on paper and engraved glass overlays, the sea is examined as a synthesis of the complex and diverse on many fluidly interacting levels, including the empirical, experiential and metaphoric. As a poetic space with many levels of resonance, it becomes ground for exploring the creative process, the nature of being and processes of transformation and change within each. Research questions include: What might a contemporary expression of the interaction of the physical and metaphysical self be like? How might a synthesis of abstraction and representation be created in the visual language of painting? How might concepts of unity be reconciled with rhythms of death and renewal, transformation and change? Does unity necessarily mean uniform? A significant aspect of this research has been the generation of artworks on or through field trips to locations by the sea - Cape Leveque in North-east Australia, Heron Island Research Station on the Great Barrier Reef and South Bruny Island in Tasmania. In exploring the interface between abstraction and representation, unity and diversity, and the inner and outer worlds, I have discovered the sea rich ground for reenvisioning these seeming opposites as co-creative, relational and finally inseparable. The ‘Wave’ structure of the Exegesis is more than usually organic in form. Conventional chapters are replaced by multiple and varied sections, each called a WAVE and written in changing ‘voice’. Echoing the shifting rhythms of the sea, and in order to correspond more directly to the way practice-driven research creates meaning, the wave structure reflects the wider concerns of the research to synthesise the unexpected and diverse.