Artist Statement
A device of limited capacity when compared to computers or even digital copiers, an analogue photocopier provides exciting possibilities for invention. Paper jams, random enlargements, moving images during copying and other ‘interferences’ or ‘happenings’ can produce surprising visual effects. In this work an image is re-fed back into the photocopier up to three times at different enlargement settings creating multiple layered chance distortions. Photocopy images are then rendered in watercolour or as screen-prints on a variety of different substrates.
These actions have significance when considered in the context of modernist painting. For example, an image produced as a result of a photo-copier procedure, instead of a splash of paint from a brush, challenges conventional notions of painterly spontaneity and how this is manifest in art.
Works take on the appearance of paintings, but are not made using traditional painting means. Boundaries used to define painting are expanded, making it possible to continue the exploration of themes once considered arcane. The input of machines and the specific qualities they add to process and object questions accepted notions of authenticity and authorship.
David Hawley
August 2011