31 x 31 cm - acrylic on canvas
The chair and the volcano haunt me every time I pick up the brush. For once, I’ve stopped resisting. I simply follow the repetition, as my hands seem capable of nothing else lately—only empty chairs and erupting volcanoes.
As I gave up asking why, the memory sharpened. Ten years ago in Galway, I bought a pen-and-ink sketch from a street artist. It depicted a group of eccentric figures in an elegant dining room, oblivious to a giant whale floating over their heads. I’ve carried that image in my mind for a decade, never suspecting it would resurface through my own hands all these years later
Inspired by the 'unsaid' that haunts a household, these works explore the burning, hidden currents of family life. They dwell in the gap between the polished mask of a happy family and the raw, volcanic truths that spill out onto the furniture of our daily lives.
Much like the whale suspended over the dinner table in that Galway sketch, we are surrounded by erupting volcanoes, yet we choose to look away. We prefer the quiet agony of unhealed burns to the clarity of the fire. We retreat into the shadows of our own lives rather than facing the volcano, rather than becoming the volcano—rather than finally accepting the heat of our true selves.
These paintings serve as my visual study of denial: a reflection on how we maintain the polished surfaces of our lives while ignoring the tectonic shifts occurring just beneath them.
Through repetitive brushwork, I invite you to stop looking away. My work is a challenge to trade the quiet agony of unhealed wounds for the transformative heat of the volcano—an urge to finally accept the raw, erupting truths of who we truly are.
