Christian Breed
Artist Statement
My paintings explore light as the common root of vulnerability and power in textiles. The symbols that are contained on textiles are activated by light, their luminosity reflects the fragility of the physical material and the energy of its visual language. In my work, patterned textiles are the link between the figurative and the abstract. They are also the bridge between the interior and the exterior; that which I am a part of and that which surrounds me. Folds and knots are interruptions in their patterns, and these interruptions provide a discontinuity in visual language that allows the richness of the outside world into the textile. My paintings investigate this process of opening and closing, focusing specifically on ways in which the information in patterned textiles flows outwards, suffusing itself into the geometries and structures of the urban environment.