'Berlin Frosch'

3ft x 3ft Painting: Window Frame, Canvas, Photographs, Letters, String, Poster, Tyres, Books, Plastic, Spray Paint, Paint.


This piece was made shortly after a trip to Berlin, and focuses on the the culture that I encountered there. I was overawed by the sheer diversity of the city, I had never been to a place where you could find historical landmarks like the Berlin Wall, around the corner from alternative art galleries exhibiting contemporary art in old factory buildings. What I saw excited me, it was like some utopian world that I had come across, like some dream from which I did not want to awake. I collected objects form a 'floh markt' that I visited, which in itself was full of an unimaginable amount of treasure. I wanted to try and capture what I saw there and use this piece as a shrine, or a memorial as it were. This idea was made more important by it being my birthday while I was there, a landmark represented by my being, of which will eventually have a contrasting memorial of a tombstone as the date of my death. I wanted to place the piece on the floor (not on the wall like conventional paintings), to represent the 'Treschelles Gallery' that I visited, a hub of alternative art and music. I then attached objects which I had acquired on my trip and then wrote the date of my time there. I like to think of it as physical memory.