Three Questions to
Patricia Cain
You’ve suggested that
My personal experience of ‘coming to know’
the
important
through making work, is that it is both gradual
question for a maker
and often physically tied up with the processes I
is what they ‘come to
mention above. So coming to know, or becoming
know about the world
aware - which is a matter of consciousness - often
through making an art-
happens because as artists, we’re perhaps able to
work.’ What has this lat-
transform our physical experiences of the process.
est trajectory revealed?
My self-awareness grows because through art,
most
I’m able to realise connections between my own experiences and the world at large. Processes such as letting go or being connected subconsciously manifest themselves in my work. So coming to know depends on developing an internal life of In your latest group of
It’s good to be as close to nature as possible, and I
works there’s a strong
think I’m part of the lineage of artists who have be-
sense of growth and
come more intimately connected to nature through
the
of
observation and attention. I’m not making to rep-
nature. How would you
licate, but to engage in a process. So the energy in
describe the energy in
the work is formed through the dynamic process
your compositions?
between what I’m observing and making - perhaps
architecture
documenting my evolving relationship with nature, and this circular process feels like it makes itself. And whilst it’s possible to talk about the subject matter or form of what any particular piece of work ‘is about’ (for example, you’ve mentioned the sense of growth and architecture of nature), for me, my work is more the consequence or evidence of the energy of this evolving dynamic process, and this doesn’t end with the finishing of one particular piece of work. 22
Map i | coloured pencil | 61cm x 81cm
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