Painting Ourselves EXJ

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 Jo Beale

Charcoal, Pastel, Gouache

44" X 30"

Painting Ourselves (The Other Is Us)

   The work is about painting, I am viewing a subject and then making an image. For me the most challenging and troublesome subjects are people. This work is a way for me to understand being with people, painting to work out concerns about identity and social identity.

    I placed images of people on my canvas, within my most intimate space. Unanticipated complications took place during the painting process. A kind of exchange began to occur between the likeness I was creating and my objective, which was to start with, to simply paint a person. I was startled by the feeling that I wasn’t alone, I even felt that I was not singularly responsible for the results. I felt the subjects were also asking me what I was asking of them.  Lots of questions and misunderstandings remain still. 

   Through my engagement with the exercise I am aware of a new openness and vulnerability in myself.  The exciting thing is that the investigation will go on forever. 

                                                          J

   The title and the signature are made up of two groups of letters with the symbol X between them. 

   The X means- by or times or multiplied or affected or effected.

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