immanence

I like to attempt the impossible when I do art. I don't always do it, but one of the things I do is to find images I like and use them as references. I always fail but in interesting ways. 

There's something mysterious about what artists do. There's a kind of alchemy. They just apply paint and you can see that that's what they're doing, but then, when you look at it afterwards, it's not just paint - it's an image of something. The mechanics of it are easier than we expect. For example, facial features are represented by a couple of short lines. 

My favorite kind of art is impressionsism because you can see both the paintedness of the work and what it represents. There's something very beautiful about that - more beautiful, I think, than art work that is more realistic. With impressionism, the artist makes it very clear that the work is a painting, but there's also a faithfulness to the subject, which creates a tension between abstraction and reality. 

I've always liked the idea of 'the flawed masterpiece', but I mean that in a different way to how the expression is often used. I think it's often used to describe something that is really good but has a flaw that stops it from being a true masterpiece. I like the idea of the flaw being what makes the work a masterpiece. 

The concept we have of perfection is anaemic and lifeless. We imagine perfection as being far away from everyday life and ordinary people. But there's a kind of perfection that is already here. You're alive. It's a miracle.