Jan Colwyn Foulkes
Lives and works in London, U.K.
My work is influenced by patterns, surfaces and textures found in the natural world. My recent paintings focus on the wings of butterflies, in particular large tropical butterflies found in South America. I want the work to suggest the fragile, transient nature of the insect's life.
I use photographic images as my starting point. I take photographs of butterflies, then I select snatches and fragments of the iridescent wings and weave these into the paintings to create semi abstract forms. Still, with a sense of flow and movement.
My paintings try to suggest the dreamlike quality of our own human existence, blurred, fragmented, chaotic and intangible. Always just out of our grasp, leaving traces in our memory of places and things.
The use of colour, surface and texture are the most important aspects of my work. The painting process is lengthy and complex, with much re-working. I cannot predict the moment when I will be satisfied with the result. When there is a perfect tension between the surface and the image itself, that is when the painting has finally come to life and the process is complete.