Pentimenti and other Doubts

Pentimenti and other Doubts

Working on a new series of paintings concerned with Pentimenti.

 

Pentimento is an Italian word used to describe changes that an artist may have made during the painting process. As oil paintings age, the top or surface layers may become slightly transparent, revealing the underlying layers and subsequently the changes that the artist may have made during the painting’s making. They may show that elements in the painting have been moved, rearranged or painted over. They effectively show the history and hidden secrets of the painting’s making. However, I was not drawn to Pentimento through the study of paintings, but rather through observing the ever changing light and mists of North Mayo. How hills and stacks appear, are clouded over, disappear and often reappear in another guise, colour or form. Looking at this ever changing landscape is very much like observing Pentimenti in a painting. It confronts us with time and space. Allows us to look through the layers of time at what was and what might come.

 

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