and documents them among many other experiments, all in service of coming to a greater understanding of the true nature of light and colour in the world around him.

Robert's Head - 45x51cm oil on canvas 2016

There is a story behind this painting. One of convergence or synchronicity, mere coincidence or perhaps a random series of events. However, even if it be merely random these events led me to something altogether quite the most generative and fruitful indeed.

This is one of those paintings which started and continued to be unfinishable so it was thrown aside in 2014. I picked up in 2016, turned it upside down and within a few strokes it became this.

During the repainting I heard in my head “Roberts Head”, repeatadly. Which Robert? Why Robert?

Within the same space of time I heard for the first time on the radio in the car about the Irish Alchemist, Robert Boyle, a natural philosopher. He had written a book about colour, in 1664. Available online I began my intriguing and ongoing journey with Mr Boyle.

(Talking History - The first modern scientist on Newstalk with Eoin Gill and other scholars)

Diaphanous Bodies, Shining Bodies and Colour’d Bodies are terms used repeatedly throughout the text. I took these as my starting point and continued the series of 'body' paintings I started in 2016. 

The work maps internal space, invisible to the eye, continuing an abiding exploration into awareness of the subtle body, where colour and form are felt out and structure shifts until a rightness or truth is felt.

Another aspect of the writings I appreciate is Boyle's obvious curiosity and enjoyment of devising experiments to prove or disprove the emphatical nature of colour in a body; his loose almost hobby-like examination of all manner of colour related subjects. I revel in the run on sentences and terms I must look up to understand. I used Boyle's text as a prompt and reminder to conduct my own 'promiscuous experiments' within the realm of light, colour, reflection, and refraction.