My Creative Practice
How can phenomenological analysis present new meanings of bodily experiences in a material landscape, exploring the relationship of temporality and landscape through painting?
Current investigations include the Caradon Hill district area combined with a contemporary approach to painting. This body of work aims to describe the material encounters of the Cornish Moors and illustrates the experience of landscape through a combination of site specific materials included in the work.
‘Material Landscape’ offers insights of my own situated knowledge of place. The paintings challenge the physical dynamics of understanding experience in place as well as regarding the material forms we all immerse ourselves within. These site specific pieces not only represent the heritage of the Moors but represents the cultural and social history of place that we all encounters.
My research project examines phenomenological agendas to embed experience as a method for painting. It is concerned with expanding theories of phenomenology, initiating a series of discussions surrounding; temporality, materiality and painting in a contemporary arts practice. This has contributed to the development of a new trajectory in my creative practice.
Phenomenology is a first person perspective, studying the structures in which we experience. My study has used phenomenology as a method to understand the structures of my own encounters within the Cornish landscape. These forms of experience range from perception, memory, thought and bodily actions, typically what (Husserl, 2012) suggested as ‘intentionality’ which makes up the content of experience. Through reflection, I have developed an awareness of my own experience, self consciousness and embodied action, becoming aware of my own movement in the landscape. Thus phenomenology has led from conscious experience to circumstances that assist in understanding the intentionality of my own experience.
My study has begun to redescribe the reciprocal relationships I have formed with the landscape over time, which outlines the structure of my practice. The aim of the project was therefore to determine whether painting can constitute as an equivalent to a material experience and to provide a philosophical justification for phenomenology as a broader dialogue in painting.
