Liminal Liberty - Spring

Liminal Liberty — Spring
Cold wax and oil on canvas

In Spring the collective face comes closest to the surface. A mouth, a closed eye and the line of a cheek emerge from ochre on one side and pale blue on the other, as if the figures have pressed together into one countenance that is not quite awake. Cold wax is built up and scraped back, so the surface becomes stratigraphy, evidence of having been here: a cave painting in reverse. The four seasons run backwards, from Autumn to Winter, because even they are held in imposed liminality. Spring is therefore not a beginning. It is the last thaw before the cold, an awakening that leads nowhere. As in Eliot's The Waste Land, April is the cruelest month, and here liberty means staying visible while the season turns against you.