It was after viewing the painting by David Bomberg titled An Evening in the City of London, painted in 1944 that made me first consider what a contemporary painting of London might look like. Bomberg's expressive work depicted a view of the bombed remnants of buildings after the Blitz with St Paul's Cathedral in the distance. It was a powerful painted document of the time, which led me to consider how an image of London could be explored and portrayed through painting today. 

The first painting for this series was completed at the time of the November election of 2019 with the Brexit decision lingering. When I first posted the image, I had written in the description - The dawning of a new age or an apocalyptic vision?  I could have never imagined  that only a couple of months later the daily life of the world would essentially come to a halt through the threat of a new virus. 

In the confines of my London studio I chose to focus on two main compositional view points for the following paintings, either looking down the river Thames towards Southbank or looking up back up the river towards Tower Bridge. Within these compositions I set to exploring new techniques and approaches with the paint itself as well as exploring new concepts.  Many of the works attempt to capture the  movement and energy of the city through slivering lines of colour (the rhythms of the movements of people and traffic but also the flow of the river),  whilst other works explore the cycles of destruction and regrowth though its architectural forms. The rhythms of the river and the relationship between the sky and the water are another key element.   

One of the last paintings of the series depicts London as a locked down city, which nods back to the Bomberg painting by including a view of Saint Paul's Cathedral. Although the painting titled Regenesis evokes London's own history of great fires and bombed buildings, it could also allude to the cycles of any great civilisation or city, in constant states of transmutation and aspirations for a brighter future.

 

Jimmy. C  March 2021