Damian Elwes

The day before the above photo was taken I visited my friend David Hockney at his studio. He was making large Abstract paintings with protruding sculptures and he asked me, “What could be more spiritual than Abstraction?”

I said, “Trees! If there is a God then Nature is his canvas.”

The next day David came to see my Rainforest exhibition.He loved the paintings but he also admired the way I was joining paintings together to create a 360 degree painting. He soon began painting trees and at the end of his life he made a 360 degree artwork on his iPad which is currently on view at The Serpentine Gallery in London.

1997 EDGE OF THE FOREST

 “Edge of the Forest” was the first of 4 installations created in Colombia. 12 paintings join together in a square 360 degree configuration. The viewer finds themselves in an exotic garden with a house on one side and the rain forest on the opposite side. It represented Damian’s choice at that time: to stay in the life he had grown accustomed to or to venture into the unknown.

(CLICK ON IMAGE ABOVE TO SCROLL ALL 12 PAINTINGS)