This piece is from around the same time as Cathedral. It is quite a loose study from a photograph of a window in the landmark Robinson and Cleaver building in the centre of Belfast. I used white and grey crayon. I experimented by using black paper to try and heighten the drama and add to the night time feel. The white eyes of the carved heads are exaggerated for ominous effect.
This piece is from 2001, simplified from a photograph taken looking up at Saint Anne’s Cathedral in Belfast. I was working quickly using various shades of compressed charcoal. Although the drawing has it’s faults, I think it does project a certain energy. It’s good to look over old work from time to time.
This is a small recent piece which employs the pastel palette I have favoured lately. The bomber suggests threat. Holes could be for rivets or made by bullets. The fragility and transience of all existence is implicit.
Anything built can be destroyed.
Translates as “the city lies in dust.” This is a large piece on wood currently on show as part of Cathedral Studios ten year anniversary exhibition at the Water front hall in Belfast. This image Contains a reworking of 3 Black Flags, an earlier piece. The exhibition runs until the 30th of August.
Collaged from old photographs of Belfast alongside an old map of the city. A certain famous and tragic ship also features.
A recent experimental piece using found photographs manipulated in Photoshop. I am fascinated by early photography and old anatomical diagrams. I am slowly learning how to use the program.
This is quite an old piece, from my art college days. The composition is adapted from a photograph of the roof of a dilapidated building, exposed beams were silhouetted against grey skies. Layers of compressed charcoal and graphite were repeatedly worked to become dense, then the cross or crane like form was erased from the black.
The cross shape and the title are deliberately ambiguous and open to interpretation, like most of my work. Author and friend Dr Peter Rollins now owns the piece, I think he found it resonated with some of his thought.
This relatively large scale piece was made on several pieces of packaging card that were joined with tape. The edges were deliberately ripped to fit with the worn and weather beaten feel I was trying to project around this time. The elongated ‘H’ like structure of the piece is influenced by the bold brushwork of Franz Kline and by decaying machinery of Belfast’s industrial past. Figures can be discerned in the ambiguous black shapes in the central band.
John Macormac 