My practise is fuelled with a need to decipher ideas of erotiscism, anxiety and power in relation to the image. Therefore with the use of the Travel Award I could travel to both Berlin and Rome wherein there were works I could see in the flesh such as Carravagio and Ribera to contemporary pieces by artists such as Hans Kreister and Micheal Borremans. My work strives to open up certain attitudes and morals in relation to specific images and question these ideas. These places in both their differing historical pasts and the way both socially and politically they are confronting them as well as the diverse population added to the experience in terms of a personal and practise based trip that otherwise I would never have been able to witness first hand and has a great impact on my career as a painter.
My aim through the use of paint and that specifically of oil painting and its obvious art historical weight is to bring the viewer into a space into which they feel at once seduced yet confronted with a deeper and perverse motive. This is not shock but to open up a platform that engages with freedom, violence, and death.
Websites: www.charliesmithlondon.com
www.thomaswilliamsfineart.com
www.braubachfive.de
www.onetwentygallery.com