Liz Hawkes deNiord

These abstract works address the distillation of dreams, emotions and the ‘present’ in a visual language, marking the ordinary as extraordinary, or the smallest thing as notable. These thick impasto layers reveal recurring iconographic markings: the horizontal plane, the circle or void, the crest. They are the indicators, entrances, passports.

I look to the natural world and to the beauty and mess of daily living. I read and journal and absorb as much as possible from being present to all that surrounds me. Paintings emerge from this, addressing the ephemeral and things that cannot stay- things that morph, divide, erode, mutate, reflect, shimmer, disseminate, evaporate, break, fade, dissolve.

Mark making with paint sets up calls and responses, creating a back and forth exchange on the canvas and also, even unconsciously, when not in the studio. “Echoes, mirages, phantoms, hallucinations and like a dream..” One needs to 'pay attention' consciously and unconsciously. My process is one of multiple layering, scraping, covering up, building up heavily textured surfaces with palette knife and paint. People ask me how I know a painting is ‘finished’- usually I can tell when it sings.