Memory boxes, oil on canvas, 2008, 110 × 10 cm (3′ 6″ × 4″)
I wanted to produce a painting for a friend and asked him to provide me with some idea of what he might like the subject to be. In response he produced fifteen or so photos that he’d taken over the past year. I decided to select small squares from the images and fuse them together in a chromatic progression. In isolating small regions of the photographs they become more abstract and less obviously comprehensible to the viewer, alluding to the unique and context-dependent nature of memory. The chromatic progression that leads us though the image from left to right suggests time passing and the way in which the accumulation of new memories enriches and modifies our identity.