M A R K S   A A R D S M A

S T A T E M E N T

For several decades, I have explored the ontology of painting - the nature of  painting in and of itself, investigating the essential properties of painting: color, line and rhythm, surface texture and tension, shadow and light... principally via subtraction or deconstruction of canvas to reveal its original structure - vertical and horizontal threads or lines - and eliminating all the 'stuff' artists have been adding to the canvas surface for centuries.  The result is line, light, shadow.  For the paper pieces I've continued  subtraction, creating the lines and their shadows from the lines torn into the paper. My work is pure and clean and raw. The space is physical, not illusory. My canvas and paper pieces are not abstractions of an objective reality, but expressions of object-ness - all the visual aspects of my work are real and immediate.

Paper paintings canvas painting

CANVAS

PAPER