Significant Other, 2016, oil on canvas, 122 x 86cm
Other Half, 2016, oil on canvas, 122 x 86cm
Owl Night Long, 2016, oil and wax on canvas, 101 x 71cm
Eternal Other, 2016, oil and wax on canvas, 101 x71cm
Journey to the Sun, 2016, oil and wax on canvas, 101 x 71cm
Hiss you Were Here, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 50 x 40cm
Tangled Thoughts, 2015, oil on canvas, 50 x 40cm
Let us Prey, 2016, oil on canvas, 50 x 40cm
Ice Trap, 2015, oil on canvas, 50 x 40cm
Sunset Overdrive, 2016, oil on canvas, 50 x 40cm
Bald Eagle, 2015, oil on canvas, 50 x 40cm
Porpoiseful Seduction, 2015, oil on canvas, 50 x 40cm
Other Places, 2015, oil on canvas, 50 x 40cm
Other Way Round, 2016, oil on canvas, 50 x 35cm
Happiness by Design, 2015, oil on canvas, 50 x 35cm
In Other Worlds, 2016, oil on canvas, 50 x 35cm
Swamped, 2015, oil on canvas, 50 x 30cm
Orbiter, 2016, oil on canvas, 50 x 30cm
Imagi-nation, 2016, oil on canvas, 50 x 30cm
War Paint, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 50 x 30cm
Space Bunny, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 50 x 30cm
Space Cadet, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 50 x 30cm
Reality Eclipse, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 50 x 30cm
Deal or no Deal, 2015, oil on canvas, 50 x 30cm
Sanity Masquerade, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 50 x 30cm
Face Mask, 2016, oil on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Worlds Away, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Lost in Space, 2016, oil on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Love Triangle, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Face Paint, 2015, oil on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Nothing to See, 2016, oil on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Animal Intent, 2015, oil on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Ways of Seeing, 2015, oil on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Mask of Sanity, 2016, oil on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Other Forms, 2015, oil on canvas, 40 x 30cm
The Other Side, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 40 x 30cm
Death by Paradise, 2015, oil and wax on canvas, 40 x 30cm
DeathTriangle, 2016, oil on canvas, 35 x 30cm
Shape Face, 2015, oil on canvas, 35 x 30cm
There is no Other uses a central motif of masking as a veil between enhancing reality and actuality. Through a variety of paint handling the work positions the painted surface as a façade; a threshold between self and other.
This application creates a fractured collage effect where abstract forms obscure figurative space and pockets of landscape tease the viewer with visual tropes and clichés.
The work parallels social media where identities are edited, airbrushed and assembled. Simpson reveals a surreal interpretation of this confluence between self and other that can never be truly unmasked.
In the work, forms are hard edged, gesturally rendered and abruptly layered. Youthful figures are cropped, dislocated and objectified. On the surface colours are shifting and glowing. The altered hue and saturation of the everyday appears otherworldly. The influence of technology on identity reconstruction is echoed in the works’ digital aesthetic and ruptured surface. The contradictory nature of this threshold throws up a purgatory, utopia or refuge – a place where authentic and inauthentic, self and otherness collide.