Narratives of Shape and Colour

Abstract

My practice-led research investigates how narrative concepts can be employed to generate abstract compositions in painting, drawing and print. The project challenges the view that narrative and abstract art are mutually exclusive forms by creating abstract artworks that employ narrative concepts and strategies. My research negotiates this by identifying the essential components of narrative and proposing that they can also function as formal elements in an abstract work. This is supported by theories of narrative that present it as a set of structural conventions that mediate and summarise real or imagined events, and make them conform to the material limits of an artwork. The research question is tested exhaustively in the studio using a variety of forms and methods: including digital sketches, pen and ink drawings, scanography, and densely layered paintings. My abstract compositions begin by conforming to the material limits of the flat picture plane, yet by applying narrative concepts they expand to project speculative histories and alternative versions of themselves.