Inside out: (Looking for Kandinsky)

On a recent trip to Paris I was searching for the place where Kandinsky lived; nearby I found a banner of coloured triangles, blowing in the breeze.

My paintings can be described as non-objective, or geometric and abstract.  I choose to work with colours instead of sounds, but the work is about music.

I am inspired by both the history of abstraction in painting and music elements. My process incorporates strategies that address an informal set of rules such as are found in games; for example, the movements of the pieces in chess, and mathematics  including the division as applied to the grid, an underlying structural element. I have always liked making large paintings, the multi-panel format allows that to happen, in a flexible way; paintings can grow horizontally, vertically, and can more easily be transported.

Red, blood orange, yellow: the colours of sunset; In "Trio in blood orange The squares have left the grid and are moving outward and sideways", multiple panels (3 sets of 3) allow the possibility of numerous readings compared to a single image. The wall becomes the canvas, and the panels

I refer in my paintings to the forms and musical structures, theme and variations, transposition, pitch and timbre, rhythm and repetition. now colour also seemed able to offer a set of quiet internal reflections.  “six by five, red and yellow”

The "suite in red major ", 12 panels, 4 rows in 3 columns The canvas is divided into twelve equal square panels; within each panel, square shapes are drawn together and divided diagonally; new rhythms are created; the panels are rotated to reveal new possibilities in image. “suite of 12”;  12 panels 20cm square; 4 rows in 3 columns; acrylic and oil on canvas; 90 X 70cm;  "Polychrome in blood orange and yellow"; acrylic on canvas; 123, 138cm;  “Trio in blood orange”,  acrylic on 9 canvas panels, 3 rows in 3 colums; 142 x 246 cm, 2015

The squares have left the grid and are moving from the inside out; multiple panels allow the possibility of numerous readings compared to a single image. His works investigate how music and painting - geometry, pattern, colour – can provide the viewer with varying spaces for internal reflection

(Contemporary French composer Olivier Messiaen experienced something like synaesthesia, his hearing and vision were united in a sort of “colour hearing”, giving chords a physical dimension, at one point blue-violet, at other points there are flashes of bright gold, orange, royal blue, deep red. For Messiaen chords conjure colour, they can sound jarringly dissonant but for Messiaen, their complex colour combinations transformed into dazzling stained glass windows.)