Pesticides
The excessive and indiscriminate use of pesticides has been recognised as a severe threat to plants and flowers due to the effect on insect pollinators. My images act as a metaphor for this by printing the image and spraying it with pesticide.
Different results are obtained by spraying direct from the pesticide bottle or by using mist sprayers. Tilting the paper causes the inks to run and produces different patterns. None of the methods are entirely controllable and the end results contain a significant element of chance. This is in the tradition of the surrealist movement embracing chance. The images are then scanned as the original prints are not stable following the application of the pesticide.
The influence of my study of Japanese art is evident in these pesticide images. The asymmetry, broad areas of colour and flatness of the picture plane are typical of the Japanese art, particularly woodblock prints, which influenced artists in Europe and America at the end of the 19th century. These pesticide images exhibit similar characteristics.
I think the fact that the ‘damage’ to the floral image has been caused by a pesticide gives an added layer of meaning. A similar effect could possibly have been achieved by spraying water or some other liquid. The effects, however, are produced by something that has significance (pesticide) and we have a distrust of pesticides, so the image of a damaged flower is given extra resonance by the knowledge that it has been created in this way.
The image also poses the question can beauty be born of poison? People do find the images attractive, but should their means of production temper that view? It comes back to the issue of context again, once viewers know that the images were produced by the application of pesticide does their appreciation of the image change.