Michael Balfe

7 April 1981 - 25 April 1981
Opening Reception 7 April 1981 12pm

Main Gallery:

Dyads

This new series of paintings is an extension of earlier concerns involving structural order and serial variance reacting within a set of prescribed criteria. The new work develops this attitude towards prescribed criteria, that is, defined areas of choice as opposed to unbounded arbitrary choice, by allowing the interaction between structure (rational clarity) and introduced variables (diversity) to generate new forms from the parent shapes of the series. This is a strategy for giving literal form to painting beyond the neutrality of the square or the safe harbour of the rectangle. These new shapes activate the wall space around them and create a dialogue between one piece and another with the context of the series.

The scale of the pieces is based on a circle with a diameter that is equal to the length of my arms outstretched. The centre of the circle is located 54″ above the floor on a metaphoric horizon (my chest length)/

morphology:
arc: periphery
centre: vanishing point
diameter: junction
cut:stratem
surface: skin
colour:hedonic tone
constant: syntax
variable: articulation