Exhibition: Origins, by Naomi Henderson

This series of paintings arose out of a need to play and experiment with the material of oil paint. I began these paintings towards the end of the pandemic, when I was feeling a need for change in my artistic expression. The first of these works were on unprimed canvas, and I used very diluted, watery paint. I liked how the paint sunk into the fibers of the canvas, creating lively, organic shapes. Play is the central approach for this series of paintings. I found it incredibly freeing to let go of representational work, and to simply live into color, movement and form for its own beauty.

As this approach began to take shape and become a style, I was intrigued by how the images looked like organic forms seen under a microscope. I became inspired by thinking about how different objects and textures would look if they were immensely magnified, such as seeds, spores, bacteria and cells. I try to convey a sense of what you are looking at through color and form, and imagine that each painting is like looking through a microscope at a usually hidden world teeming with life.