Images

Medieval Pattern

Exhibitions

Image by Martin Crampin.

Contemporary images based on medieval patterns

Archive


Towards the end of my undergraduate studies in 1995 I developed an interest in creating parallel narratives in multimedia. These interests were expressed through mythological and historical medieval Welsh texts, and in particular two stories from the Welsh collection of stories known as the Mabinogion.

Image from Gerient Son of ErbinMy first explorations in digital imaging were during the process of making several sets of images for the installation ‘Math son of Mathonwy’ in 1995, when I created a digital animation principally from a series of drawings manipulated in Photoshop. Further images created in a similar way quickly assumed a life of their own, individually and as series of images, as well as further animations for installations.

Initially I drew on the Celtic-Christian tradition for source material, as the images were created as part of my interpretation of Welsh mythology and medieval narrative. In some instances, I was particularly interested in layering different medieval periods within images as a way of suggesting historical process: a kind of archaeological layering.

Tatheus IIIThis was further developed in a body of work on two Welsh saints, Gwynllyw and Tatheus, which also incorporated architectural contexts and archaeology. Increasingly the images began to incorporate other kinds of source material, such as drawings, photographs and scanned images and texts. A similar approach was utilised in a series of three images commissioned to illustrate the work of one of the most distinctive Welsh poets of the Middle Ages, Sion Cent. They make use of medieval carving and wall painting, as well as incorporating early transcripts of the poems.

I will be adding more examples of earlier work to this page in the future. The images of Gwynllyw and Tatheus are now available on this new site. For the time being some of my previous work can be found on the pages of my old site here.

 

 

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