Tim Hemington

In Between: Oil on canvas 2005-06.

“This body of work reflects Tim Hemington’s inquiry into the relationship between abstraction and figuration; but falls somewhat outside the well established vocabulary attending these areas. Although in paint on canvas, the works resist binary oppositions familiar to the discourse surrounding contemporary painting. Individual pieces mediate a space between purity and hybridity, between flat opticality and painterly finesse. Hemington consistently maps this in between, exploring points dividing illusion and facticity. Deeply poured pools anchor aborted shapes, derived from religious drapery found in Baroque painting and gestural traces extend from absent surfaces while paint intermittently threatens to break free of the canvas. Although chance never fully presides, flatness and illusionism coexist in the very materials themselves. Brad Barnes

Welsh Surfaces: Oil on MDF. 1997.

“I put an oil painting in the rain before it was dry to see what would happen. I wanted to let nature play a literal part in the making process.” Tim Hemington

Spilt Milk: Oil on Canvas, 1996.

“Absent flat surfaces anchor deeply poured pools of paint”. Brad Barnes

Berlin Paintings: Oil on Canvas, 1994.

“FIgurative abstraction or abstract figuration. I’m really not too concerned with these terms. I’m more concerned with dance, performance, flight, paint & gesture. It is the reality of the painted surface and the desire for that surface to contain elements derived from physical movement that provide the dynamic in these works.” Tim Hemington