Ross Taylor

Ross Taylor’s practice considers the evocations and resonances of interior and exterior spaces through carefully composed images. Motifs of the ancient and the everyday are woven and spliced into layered and colour drenched works from which to decipher a personal narrative and probe the very nature of recollection and memorialising.

Taylor’s use of bold colour and disjointed perspective aims to visualise the way disparate images coalesce in our minds to form memories. Imagery taken from sketches and photographs are stitched together as a ‘fragmented’ narrative which charts a continuum of experience and a celebration of place.

Could you tell us a little more about your background, and how did you begin creating art?

I was born in Northumberland, northern England, but I am currently based in the Macedon Ranges, a rural part of Victoria, Australia. I studied at Newcastle University in England and the Academie Der Bildenden Kunste in Munich. I did a few artist residencies and shows in the UK, but wanted to make work and travel, so I accepted a solo show in Fukuoka, Japan and landed in Melbourne, Australia a year later. I grew up nestled between the English countryside and the coast, so there was no shortage of visual material, but it wasn't really a place I could establish myself as an artist. My parents pretty much gave me free reign to explore what I wanted and my art seemed to articulate what my writing couldn't.

What does your art aim to say to the viewers? 

I reference a mixed bag of imagery, from childhood holiday spots, domestic scenes and the natural world, playfully interrogating notions of my own personal history and memory. From one work to the next, the composition is morphing, shifting, self-referencing and abstracting, all according to the process of remembering. I suppose my aim for the viewer is to draw upon the complexity of the image as a critical expression of recalling an experience.   

Can you tell us about the process of creating your work? What is your daily routine when working?

After years of trying, I've realised that I can't really pick up a pencil or paintbrush until midday, so my mornings are a mixture of exercise, emails and music. I really enjoy listening to artists interviews and art podcasts while working, I think it remedies the isolation of the studio. I collect imagery for my works through photo documentation and plein air drawing, but I sometimes get lost in google street maps too and might pull something from there. I work on digital assemblages, sketches and physical collage in a process I call 'stitching' whereupon imagery is cut, overlapped and fused together. Once I have enough material to work with for the next painting or drawing. I use the 'stitched' composition as a guide for entering a new painting, after that the work goes where it wants to.

What’s the essential element in your art?

I think that tension is the primary ingredient that tells me when the work is complete. Tension infuses the imagery with a compositional dynamism that bounces the viewer’s eye around as they try to make sense of the scene. I play with fragmented perspective, introducing a deliberate and sometimes unsettling relationship between the flat,two-dimensional surface of the painting and illusory pictorial space. I'm not interested in ‘easy’ paintings and in creating such visual problems, I'm attempting to align the process of looking at these paintings with that of their making. If I have succeeded,the viewing should feel like hard work, with the occasional resting spot.

In your opinion, what role does the artist have in society? 

I think that art is essential, particularly in our current climate, as a tool to critique our governments and particular facets of society. I do believe however that art is unsure of itself currently, I think that there is a lot of back patting within institutions, a delivering of content that is seen to be 'doing the right thing' as opposed to authentic critical discourse. We need difficult conversations, not box ticking. I also think art also reminds us to slow down, to appreciate poetic, nuanced, beautiful things. I believe  that beauty or romance is often frowned upon or overlooked within the contemporary art world, at a time when perhaps it is needed most. For me as a viewer, good art is generous, honest and transcends the tricks that it employs.

Website: www.rossptaylor.com