Solo Show: Wetlands

November 26th 2022 - February 2023

 

"Wetlands are the in-between places that are both land and water, decay and growth, tension and release. They are layered borderlands of marshy terrain where time appears to stand still, while beneath the surface a slow transition takes place. Composed of rotting vegetation, dark waters and sphagnum moss, these are, to some, the lesser admired of earth’s wildernesses. To others, they are prized as deeply rich and fertile, home to rare fauna and flora with ecosystems that play a crucial role in the balance of nature.

 

These imagined landscapes are loosely remembered scenes from the past - from the lakes and ancient peat bogs of Ireland where I was raised, to the endangered wetlands of Upstate New York where I now live. The series builds on my exploration of the bonds between human and land, and the role nature can play in consoling and reviving us. 

 

These works were conceived around the birth of my first child and the period of early motherhood, itself a territory of transition and uncertainty. The act of navigating between the known and unknown is mirrored in the painting of each wetland - reducing a scene to its essentials, merging the abstract with the representational, embracing the imperfect or the ambiguous - until a sense of place unfolds. For me, they are meditations on places that offer solace and space, somewhere to reconnect to our essential nature and experience the mystery of the natural world."

 

Caroline Fay 2022