laracobden@gmail.com
www.laracobden.com
I feel most at home amongst trees. Wherever I am, the woods offer a place to retreat to, to reflect and inspire - individual trees are eternally generous and serve as a benevolent source of healing and wisdom.
Rooted in a central theme of recollection and sense of place, my paintings are informed by observation, memory and dream. They are a subjective and individual response to my surroundings, calling on an imagined, coveted past that is unreal; a magical realism. Pulling between the chimerical and the familiar - I hope there is both a stillness and fluidity in my work; in the ordinary, a sense of reverence. Paintings evolved from remembered fragments and casual snapshots shift between misty and precise, perceived reality and imagined narratives. A desire to capture the essence of experience - a fleeting moment, ephemeral and yet resilient in its presence, are what inspire me to paint.
I like to inhabit and explore this in-between place and try to collect and recreate that residue of experience; like recording details, grasping at the gossamer fabric of waking from a dream. Trees and forests offer a unique space for this journey to begin, at once interior and exterior, offering both refuge and unease, a starting point for as yet untold stories, portals into another world.