what is essential is invisible to the eye
… the distance between self and other,
inside and outside,
is hard to fix with any certainty and stability.
Float 2007
The drawings mark the beginning of a process but also the process itself. How they evolve is as much about the materials used and how the medium works on any given day as about a specific visual starting point. Whether a reflective re-acquaintance with familiar ground or an instinctive response to some unexpected stimulus (a shell, butterfly, blossom), they are about the significance of looking, remaining alive to the transience and mutability of that act of perception. They travel not so much widely as deeply, absorbing and probing the natural flow of phenomena and the passage of time. From the lines, marks and washes emerges a landscape where much of ‘what is essential is invisible to the eye.’
Maya
Painting is a continuum of moments, one in which it is not the subject matter which counts but the trace of a presence, and the process by which it is represented. The purpose is not to render the visible, but to render visible, as Paul Klee said. It is a search for what cannot be found (or which remains continually elusive). It is as though the real painting remains elsewhere – the dilemma being that to find it would not only terminate this painting but the need to paint itself.
– Luke Elwes
Wildwood, 2012
His work continues to offer a poetic mixture of exploration and meditation,
a journey intent on mapping a path that is both internal and external.
– Art First New York
Source: Luke Elwes’ blog
Images © copyright Luke Elwes
the awakened eye 