In these fragile works it would seem that the artist has pressed more than organic matter into a series of ovoid and elliptical paper epidermae. The artist's choice of material at once invites us into the confines of an ephemeral museum of nature, collected and revealed as shrouds, stains and illusions of fossilisations. Conventionally, we understand that the tools of the painter / printer are employed across a range of abstract and figurative manifestations. But in this instance, 'real nature' (or fragments thereof) is forcibly imprinted and withdrawn from the paper to create a direct trace of the organic form. In the more painterly bleeds and pressings it is almost as if the organic form is having to insist on its own presence through a welter of paint rather than the paint being used to create an illusionistic mark of nature...

Pressing Matters at West Space 1997

Amanda Johnson