Remembrance of Things Present

Remembrance of Things Present

2006, Series of 5 works, Oil on Canvas, first work 100 x 100 cm, 4 works 100 x 150 cm

Photographs: Richard Glover

Peloton Gallery, Sydney

Artist Statement 2006

This series resulted from a visit to Marcel Proust’s reconstructed bedroom in Paris and seeing objects that he had lived with whilst writing Remembrance of Things Past. There was the coat he wore – a very small man, and there was a porcelain figurine.

Painting can heighten perception; to see things that are not visible with a cursory glance but to also see things that cannot be seen in focus. These works consider how an object; the porcelain figurine, might embody Proust and Proustian memory. Proust believed that memory is by nature incomplete, and that it is essential to embrace imperfect, fleeting and disconnected images for true memory to occur.