Chimera

2009, Ink on paper, 35" x 45"

Richard A. Kirk

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This large drawing was created over a 3 month period in the summer of 2009. It is the largest ink drawing that I have completed to date. The top of the drawing was done by affixing the paper to a large drawing table and angling the surface like an easel. Once that was completed, I lowered the table to a horizontal position and completed the bottom half of the piece. It was painted entirely with 0000 watercolour brushes.

Chimera was created as an exhibition piece for ART-21, a large art fair in Cologne, Germany. The piece is meant to be an immersive visual experience. As an entry point into the work, consider that it is based in part on the following idea.

"Sunyata signifies that everything one encounters in life is empty of absolute identity, permanence, or an in-dwelling 'self'. This is because everything is inter-related and mutually dependent - never wholly self-sufficient or independent. All things are in a state of constant flux where energy and information are forever flowing throughout the natural world giving rise to and themselves undergoing major transformations with the passage of time." Wikipedia.

While I am certain there are many philosophical nuances and ramifications of this idea, I find central idea intuitively truthful and therefore illuminating and creatively stimulating.

In Chimera, the macro and micro coexist as a simultaneous experience. There are some clues to scale but these become ambiguous under scrutiny. The Chimera itself is a reinterpretation of the idea of a chimera rather than a strict traditional representation. Chimeras are symbolic of catastrophe and breathe fire. In this case the Chimera breathes a life-giving fire which ignites the explosion of limitless natural forms. In contrast, the Chimera is also Proteus which can tell the future but changes form repeatedly to avoid having to do so, an irony given the above mentioned constant flux of all things.