Phil Jarvis

I received my first paint kit at age nine,and for the last forty-three years I have been exploring visual possibilities.The paintings in this show reflect a dramatic shift in my visual outlook. Several influences have jelled together to allow my subconscious and conscious eye to merge into a fantastic experience. My conversation with the canvas has never been felt more deeply. Starting with random paint smears, rag throwing, and thinner splattering, then slowly introducing structural devices developed over the years, the painting seems to emerge on its own. The end result is an abstract representation of the questions I ask myself during that production. These paintings tend to symbolically represent my mood, the people who are in my life, my frustrations and successes, current events and my relationship to them, and simple visual harmony. As these paintings are produced they are allowed to evolve at will. The shape of the canvas and the hard wood frame are determined by the development of the image. It was a very liberating experience to break the restrictions of the conventional rectangle. A few works have even ventured a step further. These paintings have been allowed to question the need for a top, bottom, left and right in a painting.From viewing cathedrals ceilings in Italy, having decorated a few ceilings myself and drawing objects from a bird’s eye view on the floor it was revealed to me that the convention of direction in a painting can also be questioned.The challenge is to allow this phenomenon to take place while viewed on a wall. My solution was to set these images in motion. With the addition of a slow motor, a large diameter reduction gear and V-belt, I am able to rotate these large paintings slow enough to nearly go undetected.Like the minute hand on a clock, they’re always viewed in a different position. My challenge is to be comfortable with every minute. By omitting the restrictions of a stable view, new opportunities arise. Illusions that are obvious from one view diminish or disappear when upside down and other ones are allowed to appear. Although, the entire canvas can be viewed at a glance like all other paintings, what you understand about it can only be revealed in time.Whether stationary or kinetic, images fluidly shift from one to another allowing the viewer’s imagination to wander. The process is interesting to me technically, but the best part is what painting reveals to me and how final images are perceived by others. Although the freedoms that I have found are tools to get inside myself and the experience is personal the final image can evoke universal questions.The freely shaped frame and moving canvas attract the viewer initially, inviting deeper exploration of the painting.