Elise Ansel: Polarity

 ‘Polarity’ is a concept that has always defined Ansel’s practice. Using energetic gestural abstraction, she reinterprets old master paintings into a contemporary pictorial language in the process creating a tension between the source material and her own artistic voice. Through her work she aims to set aside the narrative and pictorial elements of painting thus creating room for new interpretations and perspectives, often contradicting their original intentions. The tension between these two poles charges her process of creation.

She begins her process with a series of small improvisational studies, initial interpretations that provide points of departure for her larger works. Using Renaissance methods in the process of scaling them up, her larger works embrace the choreography and consideration of her studies but with an enhanced emphasis on colour and gestural expression. This process of transcription and enlargement explores the lines between abandon and constraint, intuition and intellect and accident and design in art. In the process of reducing her inspirations to their most fundamental forms she retains their power and energy, replacing imagery with dynamic movement and dramatic colour and light.