SHAUN TAN home books paintings film and theatre comments prints FAQ about contact blog PAINTINGS GO, SAID THE BIRD (2015) The large scale paintings below were originally exhibited in a group show whose title Go, Said The Bird is drawn from a poem by T.S. Eliot Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind Cannot bear very much reality. Time past and time future What might have been and what has been Point to one end, which is always present. Four Quartets - 1 Burnt Norton, 1935 The sequence below forms a loose wordless narrative, moving from birth to death and rebirth, each painting featuring one species of bird that has learned to live successfully within human urban spaces, themes also explored in my book Tales from the Inner City. I’m particularly interested in the notion that birds’ perception and memory of space and time most likely differ radically from our own, and that such conceptions will likely prove more enduring that any human-made environment and memory. All of the landscapes are drawn from places I’ve lived within for extended periods, in Melbourne and Perth. Each painting is oil on canvas, between approximately 200 x 150cm. Some works have also been exhibited in Beinart Gallery, Warrnambool Art Gallery, Tinning Street Presents and 45 Downstairs, Melbourne. View as a gallery or click below for larger images and details. SMALL PAINTINGS I regularly paint small observational scenes on 20x15cm wooden panels, something I’ve been doing since my mid-teens, originally inspired by the 9x5 inch sketches of late 19th century Australian ‘Heidelberg’ painters, who used cigar box lids. I find that this small size encourages concise attention to light and atmosphere, and makes it possible to respond to a subject relatively quickly, especially important when painting on location. To view larger images click here. PAINTINGS 2000-2010 Like most people, I’ve been painting since I can remember, a variety of subjects ranging from fantasy to realism. In my twenties I began to focus more attentively on local subjects: portraits of family and friends, and especially suburban landscapes not far from my front door. These were personal works not originally intended for exhibition, although some have since been shown in retrospective exhibitions. This was a formative period in which I first felt some confidence about a ‘style’ of image-making, evolving naturally from observational drawing. I also came to have a better understanding of the relationship between real and painted experience, of lines and colours as ‘equivalents’ to objects and thoughts, finding the strangeness behind familiar scenes, and seeing painting as collapsed space and time. Painting as a reconstruction of memory. View as gallery