The Space Between the Shadows
SARAH MILNE
Electro Studios is about to host the premiere of an exciting and ambitious multi-sensory installation by emerging local artist Richard Best. The Space Between the Shadows: Apotheosis is a massive work that addresses massive themes – universal consciousness and connection to the Source through religion and science – with a focus on structure and balance.
Richard is an intuitive artist, fascinated by language, communication and symbols. His work is informed by study and acceptance of a universal consciousness, with a strong drive to discover the key to finding ourselves within it.
Richard has travelled this path for over twenty years. At eighteen, he learned to be an artist by training himself how to look: to develop a visual language connecting everything he learned. Late in 2019, Covid, together with a journey of personal development, provided the opportunity he needed to have the space and time to make large-scale works. Richard began working on a series of paintings that would lead him to his ‘Unity’ series: large canvasses depicting cosmic themes and symbolism. He joined the inaugural cohort of Hastings Art School last year, and the education and critique he received, from tutor Julia Kotziamani and his colleagues on the program, enabled him to develop his work into the installation he will unveil in St Leonards on 15 December.
COSMIC SYMBOLISM
The exhibition will have at its centre an immense twenty-five metre painting that will occupy the full landing gallery at Electro Studios Project Space. He will present the vast painting as an installation, with curated lighting sequences and sound. The multisensory involvement serves to amplify the cosmic narratives in the painting, to elicit feelings of wonder about the universe. Richard’s aim is “to create a space that enables viewers to become fully immersed in the work, a space so removed from the outside world that the audience is transfixed, enveloped, and affected by the themes, content, and sensation.”
He asks that viewers come with an open mind to stop, look at the universe and think about its origins and their place in it.
“As a people, throughout all time, we have found names, languages, symbols, idols and rituals that bring us close to knowing the unfathomable One: a godhead, deity, or source. Through science we develop complicated tools to see further into the macro and the micro. We have an insatiable urge to understand the very fabric of reality. As ideas combine, as globalisation occurs, as human rights develop, we benefit from the collective wisdom of a universal understanding. In collecting wisdom, we must unify in its interpretation to best serve the future of our species, our planet, and our purpose in the universe. This work seeks to provide a space for individual reflection on the profound and elusive journey of understanding why we are here.”
The Space Between the Shadows: Apotheosis by Richard Best is at Electro Studios Project Space, Landing Gallery, from 16-17 December 2023, 12-6pm, with a Private View on Friday 15 December, 6-9pm. Further info: richartbest.com
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