Lisa Russell
Lisa Russell
The search for essence
Motivated by a desire to comprehend issues of being and existing, I analyze the interactive nature of form, light, and space. This process involves a continuous questioning of objective reality, addressing fundamental questions about perception as it relates to our understanding of the physical world.
Through observation, interpretation, and abstraction of still-life arrangements, I search for underlying structures and color harmonies. Objects worked from are chosen specifically for their lack of associative detailing. Free of references to particular cultural iconography or temporal identity, their simplicity of form allows focused attention on issues of distance and closeness, unity and separateness, substance and emptiness.
This search is essentially ontological, relating to the nature and relation of being as accessed through a sensorial experience. Perceptual actualities are synthesized with a tactile affinity for paint as substance, acknowledging both physical and emotive presence.
“One searches in vain beyond phenomenon; it in itself is revelation.” Goethe