Three Semi-Abstract Versions on Fear and Isolation
In November 2021, I was working on a series reflecting on Covid-19, with an exhibition planned for the following year. I wanted to find a visual form for experiences that were difficult to grasp directly.
Questions of style and technique arose immediately. A semi-abstract approach seemed right for me. I also developed a technique suited to the project, adapting and improving it as I worked.
I began with drafts that I shared on the blog. Some of you offered perspectives that helped me think through the work, and I remain grateful for that.
How could I make the invisible visible? How could an abstract image suggest what lay behind it? Above all, how could I convey fear, uncertainty, restriction, isolation and the loss of communication—even the experience of death close to us?
A Semi-Abstract Approach
Working between abstraction and recognisable scenes gave me a way to approach those questions. Some passages look almost photographic, and photographs have a particular power to persuade us that what we see is real.
After the open landscapes of sky, mountains and water, I turned to the forest. A week before this post, I had shown In the Woods. The forest could serve as a metaphor. The sea seemed to offer another, perhaps even stronger one.
Version 1
I enjoyed painting the first version. The composition felt daring, and the image had a strength I liked. Finishing in the early hours and washing my brushes, I felt I had made a good painting. By the next morning, though, I realised I had missed my original intention.
I had wanted to carry the forest’s combination of attraction, mystery, inviting light and a barrier into the sea motif. Instead, the sea had become too optimistic, and the barrier was not convincing enough. Other parts of the painting worked better.
Version 2
In the next attempt, the sea is only suggested. A strongly marked barrier dominates: No Go. Here I also brought in something I had considered from the start but initially dismissed—a bat-like association. It remains very stylised, more a suggestion within the dark form than a depicted animal.
Version 3
Then I wondered whether the second version was too emphatic, leaving too little room for viewers to develop their own thoughts. That led to a third attempt.
These paintings may seem pessimistic. Writing in November 2021, I felt uneasy about the confidence that the crisis was already behind us. I saw optimism in stock-market prices and in renewed holiday planning, but worried about what might follow the holiday season. I was neither a virologist nor a doctor; this was my personal view at the time. What mattered for the painting was the unease that could remain beneath a return to ordinary plans.
I also tried to blur the boundary between the sea’s surface and its depths. That part of the result makes me quite happy.
Poetry is hardly my territory; my attempts go back to primary school. Still, these lines came to mind:
Such a longing for the sea
Don’t even think about it
I’ve already painted it out clearly in my head
Don’t even think about it
And now it’s at my fingertips
Don’t even think about it
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