A Hidden Music

The key to this body of work begins with the relationship of the viewer to the composition, standing or sitting before the actual work. With a willingness to engage the doors open. The composition guides us into position. The soft edges draw us in. There is an optical illusion of movement, breath expanding and contracting. The emptiness slows down the busy mind. The natural materials, natural colours and natural qualities of marks connect us to our nature. We come back to ourselves.

"When the mind is silent the heart begins to speak."
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Awareness of the breath is key to stilling the mind. Whilst painting, each brushstroke is made with a conscious breath. Empty of self it is both an assertion and a negation. An assertion through the very act of making a mark, yet a negation through the conscious breath. Building layer upon layer, each brushstroke cancels out the previous one. A cycle of being and becoming, one conscious breath after another.

Whilst attention is placed on the breath, it is the interaction of the natural materials that determines the outcome of the painting. This changes depending on the choice of canvas/ linen used, the particular dilution of paint and the type of brush applied.

​Working only with natural materials- wood, cotton canvas, linen, and oil paint, these works will naturally decompose and return back to the earth.

​These are meditative works, a place to come back to ourselves, to our true nature."

Lulu Manasseh, June 2021
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