The Listener (2025) brings us directly towards a silhouette of a face which has been cleanly carved from the left side of the composition. The silhouette does not have any individuality as it has been stripped of any emotion, expression or appearance and does not speak. It listens which turns the silence of the silhouette into an active participant in the work- the edges of this silhouette are sharp and clear while its identity is anonymous.
The silhouette’s facelessness makes the figure an archetype- a placeholder; perhaps the viewer fills in the blankness. Furthermore, the figure is facing a single shape (a triangle) on the right while the textured block of burnt sienna divides the composition into two sides- potentially stopping them from meeting.
The textures created from the sand within the composition seem to act as sediment. What has been created through time and its natural erosions- gives wear, friction and mentioned prior: erosion to the work. It thus interrupts the interaction between the silhouette and the right side of the composition without completely tearing them away from each other. The earthiness of the texture and colour also seems to give ground to the work yet the abrasion gives emotional wear. It is something slow- not fast; that the emotions are accumulating rather than suddenly breaking down.
The triangle and the other shapes within the composition are not like the silhouette. They are all geometric and thus rigid- they are hence resisting our approach as they are not organic and seem as though they are unreachable. The far right of the composition is also shadowed and seems to be a space that one cannot reach.
Hidden in One’s Own Shadow (2025) sets itself directly to us. The composition is a pair of figures who overlap each other but are not fused together. They are separate yet they cut into one another. The left figure is painted in a cold blue- upright and sharp. While the right figure is a warm orange; trailing the blue figure as though it is an afterimage. It is off-centre, less sharp and seems to be receding into the background.
The figures, though overlapping, don’t seem to touch or have any contact but rather force themselves into the viewer’s gaze. The blue shadow is forceful and pushes the more authentic orange figure backwards- thus creating tension between the two figures in the work. Behind the figures is a textured surface; yet the surface is blank pushing full view towards the two figures. However, the blankness of the background also seems to hint us towards the concept that the struggle between the figures is more internal rather than external.
The textures in the work are gritty and persistent which turns the internal concealment into friction. It has not reduced the internal self to black and white- but rather that we have two internals. One is guarded and reserved while the other one is open coexisting in a fragile space. The shadow isn’t cast by light but rather ourselves. We are the two figures- one is carrying the other and neither is one on its own.
Overall, the two works serve as contrast of the dualities of our internal mind. The two works show contrast as unresolved and not dramatised but rather something that is lived, held and within us. The figures are absorbing the outside and endure – they are not people but rather the internal state of people which listen, shield, remember, hold emotions and split.