April 29 – May 28 2018
Mindscapes is a series of monochrome drawings developed while trying to resolve several differing routes of research and interests.
The forms come from my first trip to SW France, near to the Lot Valley, where the landscape, carved from the limestone cliffs of the valley, is dry and hard and where rocks had to be rescued from the soil at each ploughing.
There is a long human history recorded by Neolithic Dolmens, monumental lone standing stones, and the later farmers’ stone Caselles that populate this difficult landscape. There are caves with stone age paintings of long extinct animals in thin lines with the shadows of human hands create by blown red and black pigment.
This landscape enhanced my interest in the ‘art’ of early humans, often carved in stone but also shown in rare surviving examples of carved wood figurines.
I search for examples across the world, many are here in Europe but surprisingly I find similar approaches to using stone in early human history in China and other Asian cultures where stone embodied philosophical and religious meaning.
The drawings also refer to my interests in African and Aboriginal art, particularly the formal approaches to representation. All these influences form a complex soup of ideas and influences which are in flux and are still intermixing through the drawings I produce.
I’m still trying to find where the fusion and combinations will lead to in the contemporary world where knowledge and enquiry is suspect, open minds crushed by the certainty founded on ignorance.
Stephen Mumberson – London 2018
Born in England in 1955 Stephen trained at Brighton University and the Royal College of Art in fine art printmaking. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Painter Printmakers and is Associate Professor in Painting and Printmaking at Middlesex University in London.