Thursday 24 March 2011

Et in Arcadia Ego.

This collection of ten etchings that I have just posted was never something planned; it started with 'Ausencia/Absence', an image based on a 4th century latin lyric poem sent by Paulinus of Nola to his old friend Ausonius; a passionate attempt to bridge the gulf that had opened up between his friend's cultured paganism and his own new found faith in Christ. I had used a variety of techniques in this etching and in order to explore these further I created new images, and yet it was only when the series was well under way that its real meaning emerged - Mortality and our transitory presence here which sometimes causes even our happier moments to be tinged with melancholy. Yet this awareness of the tyrrany of time has prompted poets and artists through the ages and in every culture to express their recognition of decay and death as a necessary precondition for the rebirth of beauty.

Et in Arcadia Ego - Seed Pods


Et in Arcadia Ego - Underworld


Et in Arcadia Ego - Fossil


Et in Arcadia Ego - Boulder


Et in Arcadia Ego - Rebirth


Et in Arcadia Ego - Petronius


Et in Arcadia Ego - Strange Fruit.


Et in Arcadia Ego - Ausencia/Absence


Et in Arcadia Ego - La Pareja


Et in Arcadia Ego - The Old Lemon