Survival
Oil on canvas
2015
Protection
Oil on canvas
2015
Philippa Graff
Johannesburg, South Africa
After graduating until 2010, I was an art teacher at various schools. This time marks my delving back into painting with a renewed energy. I was experimenting in style and subject matter. I explored realism and abstract, collage and thin washes of dripped paint. South Africa hosted the Soccer World Cup. I drew inspiration from my country, the wild life and my home. I researched trees and nature.
Work
CELTIC TREE / INDIVIDUAL TREE – 2015
– represents a sold painting
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I capture the moment in photo. It is the unplanned, involuntary visual experience that I translate into compositions on canvas.
As a child, the forest at the bottom of my garden seemed to symbolise the essence of nature in an urban context.
Rather than work from the generic concept of a tree, I have been more specific in accessing the soul of particular kinds of trees. Referring to the ancient Celtic symboism that was used as an alphabet, I have brought into existence personal metaphors of the feelings associated with those trees. Thus each painting evokes a specific mood that connotes that kind of tree.
In other works I have referenced the exterior of the trees outside, in a forest, and juxtoposed textile designs, incidicating interior on the same canvas. The warmth and mulch of the ground below the trees, connects me to the feeling of lying on a carpet in a space that I resonate with.