An Attempt to Reconcile Painting
"One must really be engaged in order to be a painter. Once obsessed by it, one eventually gets to the point where one thinks that humanity could be changed by painting. But when that passion deserts you, there is nothing else left to do, then it is better to stop altogether. Because basically painting is pure idiocy."
Gerhard Richter, in conversation with Irmeline Lebeer
While recently going through a file of notes I've written on my work over many years, I was amazed at how consistently I've continued to ask myself essentially the same question: is it possible to make a painting? The subtext of that question would actually be: given what we know about the world, and art history, is it possible to make a painting today?
I think my work originates from that position of doubt. Though during the actual act of painting it is necessarily surpressed, upon reflection on the completion of a new body of work it arises again. I think an artist makes work to try to make sense of, or give meaning to our world; to try to understand what we are doing here, why we are living; as an attempt to reconsile the absurdity of life. I think this is the essence of my work, and I try to do it simply and with clarity.
David MacWilliam
Vancouver, 1987