My Medieval Mind
MY MEDIEVAL MIND - Pure Contemplation Without Knowledge.
6 Paintings by Michael Gabriel Francas - PCWK show Nyisztor Studio 2018.
Acrylic and oils on gesso to wood panel. 300 x 300mm EA
‘The gaze of the spirit. Eschewing the terrestrial horizon’
( Jean - Clarence Lambert - from introduction to Byzantine and Russian painting
by Kostas Papaioannou )
As a painter my process allows for improvisation and accident allowing
intuition to be my guide. The result is that the painting can be as mysterious to me
the painter as it is to you the viewer.
When I see the colours and shapes that emerge I think of the medieval mindset with
its enchanting symbolisms pre the ‘correct’ perspective and realism that the
renaissance brought to painting. A more magical time, the days
of tempera painting on wood prior to the advent of oil painting on canvas.
Incised into the surface are geometric lines which allude to linear perspective.
These lines symbolize an analytical logical thought process as contrasted to the
intuitive. So I envisage in these images a tension between differing mindsets.
This interpretation is emphasised by the lack of horizon and sky which reminds me
of the Byzantine era when images could be said to be set in a divine realm thus
the lack of a terrestrial horizon.
MGF 2018