Summer 2021 | Page 69

Walt Whitman’s quote, ’Resist much, obey

little’ is my motto in life and in art. My

approach to work is intuitive and experimental

rather than theoretical. My method of art

making is not premeditated. Impassioned by

visual suggestions in my mind, the real creative

task is to bring these images to the surface..

Like fishing, I catch the fish; but, I do not make

the fish.

My art is about the discovery of the unseen

and the possible. My subjects are abstract,

using light, color, textiles, glass, and paper.

The created images are independent of visual

references to the outside world, both allowing

and resisting definition.

In my process accidents are welcome. Chance is a collaborator. The results of my experiments are unknown until the end. I am unable to recreate the same image twice.

Key to my process is intentional camera movement. With very slow shutter speed, I catch the interaction of light with the materials I choose. The use of movement allows the colors to bleed into one another, creating painterly and impressionistic images, obliterating the boundaries between photography and painting.This work intends to enhance perception and challenge the very faculty of seeing.

Digital photography has facilitated experimentation, allowing me access to new photographic terrain. The ease of production creates a multiplicity of images. This makes the task of editing very laborious, but this then becomes another step in the creative process. One has to become a brutal editor in order to identify the most compelling image and avoid the pitfalls of repetitious images.

I wish in the end to create art that appears effortless and spontaneous, using playfulness and the musicality of color to create images of ineffable mystery and explosive beauty.

email: [email protected]

website: https://shirinegill.com/

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