Matthew Burrows Award 2024

Paula MacArthur

When Nothing Else Remains

Jackson's Art Prize 2024, Bankside Gallery 2024
Oil
Canvas
100 x 100 cm

£5,950

“For me, crystals encapsulate love, life, the universe and perhaps even everything. My paintings are explorations of colour and light. They are a contemporary response to Dutch 17th century Pronkstilleven painting – ostentatious still lifes depicting desirable objects which invite us to consider the transience of life, the emptiness of wealth and the certainty of death.

The otherworldliness of these glassy, geometric forms sparks infinite imaginings on love and loss, joy and pain. In oil paint I find an equivalent magic and I use luminous colour to create intricate landscapes and new, unreachable worlds. These are metaphors for the fragility of the planet we inhabit, the human condition, but also a recognition of the potential joy in the here and now.”