On Wednesday March 16, PIASA is organising a modern and contemporary art auction.
"Everything you see is a trick of light. Light that bounces into the eye, light that casts shadows, creates depth, shapes, colours. Take away the light and it all disappears. We use vision as a means of survival and it is essential to take it for granted in order to function, but awareness allows us to look at what we are looking at and, by extension, to look at ourselves and be aware of our presence. Drawing, drawing the way this process feels and functions brings awareness into the present and into the real world, the outside world. By drawing I have made a thing, many things that are nothing in reality, useless, but I can show them and look at them and get other people to look at them and see if it can do the same for them.
Artworks are like little experiments to highlight, to imitate, to reveal what is already there but difficult to grasp. There are standard ways of doing this, but trying to invent new versions makes the work fresh and relevant. I develop projects, experiments, from previous successes, which I feel could be better or go further. An observation or variation suggests to me that I could make a new work. I have a vague sense of possibility and need to build a model to test it. I gather resources and, in the process of building, rely on trial, error and instinct to make the best of the elements. Often things don't go as planned and I have to deviate or backtrack to make it work. It's almost always a 'just right' situation, a last second leap from failure to success, and even then I have my doubts, but if I love the work and want to show it to people, I think it's probably worth taking."
Julian Opie, from Julian Opie: The Complete Editions Volume 2: 2012-2015, Alan Cristea Gallery, 2015.
