Thornton Willis

To describe 21st century spatial concepts in painting is to try to depict the basic interconnectedness of matter in which form only appears separate. In fact, all form struggles to maintain itself in the dynamic flow of space and time. The essence of nature and of our own human existence is change, movement towards or way from one form to the next.

In my paintings the forms are locked in this flux. It is part of the dynamic of the work and meant to be so. In this work, figure and ground, positive and negative are all equal. There is a suggestion of volume in the form, which continues to interest me as I work towards depicting a kind of biomorphic Cubism.

The way I work is to develop, intuitively, an image through a working process over a period of time. As the image develops, I begin making changes within that framework. The manner in which the painting happens, how it is conceived and then developed, is of particular interest to me. Either the painting is an image or it contains an image. In either case, concerning the integrity of painting, it seems preferable that the image develops out of a working painterly process, no matter how complex or simple, as opposed to the appropriation or selection of imagery based on whim or theory.

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