Light Through the Window | ESTHER DEANS & DAVID OWAIN JONES

Painting often requires paying attention to light, how it falls, where it comes from, what it’s

qualities are. It also means paying attention to the window – how the window sill frames the

light, how the subject is framed on the canvas. 

In this exhibition, Esther Deans and David Owain Jones both explore the formal and figurative

device of framing. These ‘frames’ can refer to the construction of a composition, how the

subject is framed within the picture plane. They could also be the subject itself, the frames of a

mirror in a self-portrait or the window’s edge that marks a border between inside and outside.

In David’s work, frames highlight the difference and continuity between the abstract and the

representational within one work. In Esther’s, the frame can operate within the image so that a

plate in the background becomes a frame for foreground flowers.

Together these works draw attention to how paintings are constructed and how the objects,

people, and places around us are framed by our subjective perceptions. They are paintings

about the light and also about the window.

Light through the Window is on at Susan Badcock Gallery till 21 April 2024