GarethBate.com
Frost Installation, Plastic Paintings Series Artist Statement
< Back to Menu

Artist Statement
OCAD Cafe Installation: Plastic Paintings, 2007
by Gareth Bate

This piece was created for the cafe at the Ontario College of Art & Design in Toronto. From afar it appeared that the windows looking out on to Grange Park, were completely covered in a thick sheet of ice. It reached its strongest point at sunset. The piece was very important for me because it lead to the discission not to exhibit the actual plastic pieces, and instead to show only photographs of the installations. I realized that it was only the most special moments that I wanted to present. The photograph was the only time I could present the work to other people the way I intended it.

The body of work Plastic Paintings evolved intuitively out of a desire to challenge painting and affirm its adaptability, by extending it beyond the two-dimensional surface out into the world. It incorporates painting, installation, land art, photography and video. I am excited by the idea of spatial and formless paintings that can be transformed by their environment. I see this body of work as a physical manifestation of my search for a way of understanding the world. This has lead me to the philosophy of Naturalism: the view all phenomena can be explained through study of the natural world rather than resorting to supernatural explanations. This affirms a sense of wonder and poetry in nature and science. Culture is nature, as opposed to being somehow separate, or driven by some outside spiritual force.

My paintings are constructed on the floor by sealing acrylic paint and water between hundreds of textured layers of plastic cling wrap. The transparent paint layers mix optically like glazing. The paint remains wet and is allowed to shift inside. Sheets of plastic are built up, through overlapping, until they spread out into circular, square and amorphous forms. The finished pieces are then placed in natural and urban settings as nomadic, temporary interventions. They change dramatically as they interact with different environments, light and atmospheric weather conditions.

Rather than a live encounter, this experience exists only through the frame and aura of colour photography and video.
The handmade paintings provide the accumulation of time, while photography and video preserve the ephemeral moment.
The absence of the object’s physical presence reflects my longing for a relationship with nature.

Copyright: Gareth Bate, 2007

All images & videos: copyright Gareth Bate, 2008.
Home | Artwork | CV | Bio | Press | Web Design | Writing | Links | Join Contacts | Contact Me