As the title suggests,the painting cutout series combine,
for the first time, two major practices of my work: painting and cutting.

Painting

First, I paint on both sides of a heavy cotton rag paper. There are no rules. I am free to experiment playfully. I use direct and remote techniques. Any thing around me becomes a tool. Each action or procedure brings with it its own meaning, genre, and lineage. Some part of the painting has a strong physical presence rich in details. Some other parts feel mechanic. The results of this creative play vary from monochromatic to prismatic, loosely gestural to photographic, and from abstract to figurative.

Selecting

I now need to choose, from an ever growing stack of painted papers. I need four sheets. Three painted on both sides and another painted on a single one. This one won’t be cut. On side will be display against the wall, the other will serve as a background.

Bounding

Once the choice made, I fold the papers in half and bind them together in a book-like form. One half of a painting now, faces another half. Seven times.

Cutting

It is now time to start cutting. I cut freehand with a sharp blade.I begin on the outside edge and end at the center fold. Nothing is removed. At the same time, the cut reveals and obstructs parts of the paintings. Page after page I follow a similar process, the composition of the painting/book is constructed in this specific space between the layers. In the process, my own gaze is obstructed by the pages and the overlapping content. There is so only so much that can be planned and only so much that will be discovered at any given moment.

Moral of the story

The production of these objects creates no waste and requires enacting a sort of memory game to recall what it is hidden in between and underneath as I act upon the visible surfaces. In the final presentation the “book” is opened to the last page and hung horizontally; whereupon antagonistic, now reconciled into one form.