Gabrielle Jones

Gabrielle's process charts her movements and thoughts as they play out on the canvas and questions the liquidity of materials in use, and revels in the joy of life. When I was seven, I nearly drowned. I mean, a “passed-out and needed rescue” type of drowning. My memories of that could be framed in opposites: the pounding of my heart and the quiet of the engulfing water; dark of the depths and the light of the ascent to surface; the tossing of the rip and the strong flow of the undercurrent; the strength in surviving and the fragility of life; the speed of change from safety to danger- and the stretched time of the experience of near-drowning; the liminal place between life and death, here and gone. Looking back, I realise that this has been a formative event in so much of my life -not least that I now see it influences my work. My forms often challenge their boundaries in a bid for freedom and release -canvases are butted up to make a pathway and extend the reach of forms; figures release their energy from a flat surface that engulfs and defy gravity; subjects cross boundaries between still life and movement; and forms move from naturalism to expressionism. Many circle back on themselves, reliving the experience. All seek the presence beyond logic.