STILL LIFE WITH VIRUS
Paintings and Sculpture
by Theo Angell
Petri Dish Profiles, Frontline Angels, Old Timers, Trace Contacts, Case Clusters, Vaccine Virgins and The Safety Boys of Summer!
"Due to the COVID 19 Pandemic” AND the subsequent home schooling of my two children, I found myself with a different kind of time on my hands. And so I began a series of paintings on glass. I wanted to create giant petri dish portraits of the virus as I imagined it would look magnified a million times. This work is all about colour, those globular shapes and the interaction of chemicals. Others are portraits of those involved in the fight against its spread or those who have succumbed for different reasons, all happening in the midst of our current climate. We are masked and un-masked, a living barometer gauging our reaction to this threat.
Some of my paintings happen on multiple layers of glass, creating a 3D world floating in the clear canvas. Some of them happen on giant iphones with broken screens and grievous cell damage. In each of the paintings however, beauty was attempted, politics avoided. My previous experience in painting took place in NYC and consisted almost entirely of the painting of walls, both residential and commercial, my "minimalist" phase. And my life-long work and hobbyist as a carpenter dovetails nicely with my love for frame making. Since moving to Canada I've begun a series of dioramas, sculptures and collages made entirely of wood, a few of which will be included in this show.