When Earth Feels Too Much, 520mm x 380mm x 80mm (variable), Acrylic paint, charcoal pigment, and HMA glue on 280gsm canvas.
Being on Earth sometimes feels too much to bear, and at the same time the Earth seems to be ‘feeling’ too much in that it is suffering through human causes.
The work depicts grief as a visceral, uncontainable, outward spillage of emotion; expressing unrest or seeking to escape itself. A combination of plastic and natural materials was specifically chosen to speak to climate collapse recalling unstable ecologies, oil spills, or the inevitabilities of destruction. The work has the ability to represent double meanings, as seen in its title, the chaotic shapes can also be seen as a depiction of the cerebral webs inside the brain. I aim to personify the Earth's emotions and my own climate grief through the colour black. Being on Earth sometimes feels too much to bear, and at the same time the Earth seems to be ‘feeling’ too much in that it is suffering through human causes. Like the mind, both natural and destructive, the chaos of grief cannot be contained within the restraints of a canvas.
This work was selected as a finalist for a national art award in February.
