Scott Elk
Desire Lines - Brad & Troy, 2022.
Stoneware ceramic
55cm x 55cm x 45cm approx.

This artwork is about the mixing and combining of body parts in a moment of passion. The new fleshy composition starts drifting, fragmenting, and moving at times into a monumental topographic landscape.

The original composition for this vessel was very different to this final outcome, with the kiln firing process becoming the biggest contributor, twisting, ripping and morphing the clay under the intense heat. When the work collapsed into itself, the three vessel necks moved inside, providing a curious insular inner world for the viewer to discover, with the effect produced similar to peering into a rock pool by the ocean and wondering about the multitude of organic curiosities inside.

The minimal colour palette allows the subtle use of stronger colours, and line work, to draw focus and provide movement in sharp diagonals pulling across the piece.

DETAIL:

Desire Lines

The majority of work produced in 2022 falls into my Desire Lines series of paintings, drawings, screenprints, and ceramics. The series is about relationship to place, connection to people, and the sometimes intoxicating, head-fucking connection of physical interaction.

A desire line, is a term often referred to in urban or transportation planning, as a path created as a consequence of human traffic. The path usually represents the shortest or most easily navigated route between an origin and destination. It is the way taken by choice, by desire, and by necessity when following the heart. It is movement with intention.

In a real world practical application, the desire lines have the possibility to connect people resulting in events along a time line. I see people as these spinning vortexes of energy, in a positive sense like galaxies spinning and reaching out, and in contrast, negatively sucking everything towards themselves like black holes spinning. When two of these things collide, wondrous and unexpected things can happen; colours swirl, planets could be flung out of orbit, or set in a new orbit, momentarily or until the end of time. My interpretation of these desire lines is constantly searching to insert the human element of connection into fragmented, and abstracted forms.