Painting beyond the stretcher

Abstract

This article is an extract of my Honours exegesis, Boxes of Contrast and Painting Beyond the Stretcher, completed within the Painting Department at the ANU School of Art, 2015. The article focuses on my Painting Beyond the Stretcher research, which investigates the relationship between colour, shape and materiality through the language of abstract painting. I explore the way shape, colour and material relate to each other through intuitive and responsive processes of paint application. My fundamental concerns are how these elements can construct ambiguous pictorial spaces and therefore create visual tensions within the pictorial order of marks applied. This project also explores how non-traditional painting materials can aid this, with contextual research that includes contemporary artists who work with similar ideas; such as Katharina Grosse and Jessica Stockholder. This research informs how my studio practice contributes to contemporary art and the field of an expanded notion of painting.