G L A S S L A N D S

2016 / 2017

   The series Glasslands looks at the garden as both a reflection of the natural world, and an artificial construction. According to Foucault’s concept of Heterotopia, a garden is an other place where the true wild is reflected but subversively controlled. It both imitates and contests reality by simultaneously presenting a wild environment and its opposite, an orchestrated performance of nature, a choreography of growth. 

   These 26 paintings emerged from a process of exploration beginning with pieces of painted paper cut in shapes of foliage, placed inside a mirror box (hence, glass-land). The resulting three-dimensional mirrored images shatter, amplify and disrupt conventional views of nature rendered on a flat surface, giving rise to lush compositions with depth and unexpected juxtapositions. In this restrained inventory of sources, the artificiality of the parts contrasted with recognizable flashes of leaves, branches, blades of grass. Though painting, reflection becomes invention. 

Read Accompanying Essays:

• ‘Wishful Images in a Mirror’ by Peter Johnson, Heterotopian Studies, Bath UK.

• Notes on Glasslands - Fiona Ackerman 2016