George Bataille’s theory of the informe, or formless – ‘to bring things down in the world’ corresponds with my conceptual concerns and increasingly informs my practice. Artist, John Barbour interpreted Bataille’s informe as ‘un-form’ where there is an ‘undoing of form and at the same time a yet-to-become of form…’. Barbour coined the term ‘unmade’, the title for this body of work. The works could be described as unmade objects; a result of a process (humble materials crudely handled) where I make through unmaking.
Despite using humble materials, and works often barely made, I do not wish to signify the abject; with Bataille’s informe, everything has equal status.
Unmade realises works - used discarded canvases, combined with found non-traditional materials - which attempt to subvert traditional unilateral wall-based painting (correlating with Barbour’s unmade object).
