Emerging from the Shadow: A Dance Between Light and Weight
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Size: 5ft x 4ft
Creation Date: 2024
Collection: Organic Movement
“Emerging from Shadow' gathers fragments of the moment and renders them eternal in layered abstraction.”
Emerging from the Shadow is a study in contrasts — motion and pause, rupture and repair. Painted at 60 inches by 48 inches, this oil on canvas work grew through a process of tension and release, guided by the unpredictable gesture of twine pulled across wet surface.
Using twine as a brush, I surrendered the idea of precision. Instead, I allowed the tool to drag, whip, and arc across the canvas, creating layered textures that feel almost geological — like striations in stone or currents shifting under the ocean’s surface. Thick black sweeps collide with sharp eruptions of white and gray, forming fractures, cliffs, and uncharted landscapes.
There’s violence here, but also emergence. From the dense, heavy folds at the bottom, lighter textures begin to lift upward — torn but moving — like something struggling to surface. Each mark holds a conversation between gravity and resistance, dark and light, known and unknowable. The painting is not about conquering the shadow, but living with it — allowing the dark to be part of the movement toward something new. In the act of painting, I found that the weight did not need to be erased; it needed to be honored, traced, made visible.
Emerging from the Shadow invites the viewer to linger in those raw spaces where creation feels fragile and alive. It’s a piece about carrying the mark of what has been heavy, yet still moving toward light. The twine, unpredictable and free, became the perfect instrument for this story — a reminder that sometimes the most powerful gestures are those we don’t control, but simply witness.
