Burn

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This painting came out of a period when I was moving away from carefully planned colour fields and letting the painting become much more intuitive. I was layering, covering, uncovering, and following marks as they emerged, trying to keep the depth and atmosphere of the earlier work while allowing the surface to become denser and more physical.

The orange and red seem to burn underneath a pale violet-grey field, while the white marks gather, break apart, and tangle across the surface. I still read something fire-like in it — heat changing the state of something, flame becoming smoke or an ember disappearing under ash — but it also moves between nerves, roots, fragments, writing, and plant matter.

What interests me most now is the enmeshment. There isn’t really a single figure or event to hold onto. The marks keep passing through and over one another until the painting becomes its own little system: part atmosphere, part body, part communication.

At the time, my smaller works dealt with fragmentation and enmeshment, while the larger paintings moved into symbols, communication, juxtaposition, and the attempt to bridge void spaces with potential forms of communication.

Where it's been: Circles, curated by Annie Gao, Chinatown Centre, 222 Spadina Ave., Toronto, ON, 2024