Eden. Exile. Babel: an exploration through contemporary painting practice of the interrelationship between human experience and the divine via the thematic symbolism of Genesis

摘要

Through this project I have explored the possibilities of contemporary painting practice as a mode for investigating concepts of human-divine interrelationship, via an exploration of the themes of Eden, Exile and Babel derived from the Old Testament book of Genesis. These themes relate to the Genesis narratives of the Garden of Eden, the “expulsion from the garden”, and the Tower of Babel. I have explored the possibilities of these as thematic symbols in the development and construction of painting based artworks, which re-examine the content, imagery and meaning of Genesis and its possibilities as a re-interpreted textual source in contemporary painting practice. Specifically through the artworks I have explored notions of human-divine interrelationship in connection with the following: the possibilities of the natural world and landscape in painting as a metaphoric carrier of divinity; humanity as an “image bearer” of the divine; divinity in relation to a dimension of “timelessness” existing outside of linear or chronological time connected with ‘a-temporal’ zones of the infinite and the eternal; and the possibilities of painting as a medium embodying notions and experiences of divinity, and its potential to bend or slow time in relation to exploring human experience in connection to a divine dimension.