Write Back

According to anthropologist Helen Fisher (TEDtalk 2008), love is not an emotion or feeling, rather it activates the part of the brain to do with motivation, wanting and drive: “love comes from the motor of the mind”. By exploring the modes we use to communicate and experience love, I recognised my habit of collecting every letter or note people have written me over twenty-two years, letters I have written myself that remain unsent or work as a means of confession. Letters are the substance of abstract feelings and thoughts: they are what have driven the process of my work. 

Painting each compilation of letters caused me to reflect on my initial feelings and memories when I received the letters. The time I spent rendering the unique handwriting in each letter was important to me. One can recognise intent, thought patterns and feelings within handwriting in the same way that “parts of the human brain are fine-tuned to process faces, colours and motion without conscious thought” (Fisher 2008). I began to analyse the layers of the relationships I've experienced in my life and the way they have evolved: while some have faded away or ended abruptly, leaving a sense of pain when rereading the letters, others have endured over the years, bringing a sense of appreciation when rereading the letters.