A Deeper Understanding: Responding to Tobias and the Angel was an exhibition at Oriel Davies Gallery inviting contemporary reflections on the painting Tobias and the Angel from the Workshop of Andrea del Verrocchio, on loan from the National Gallery in London.
When Steffan Jones-Hughes invited me to respond to Tobias and the Angel by Verocchio, I visited the National Gallery in London to see the painting in person. There are often qualities of scale, surface and pigment that cannot be found in any reproduction. I wanted to discover my response in relation to the original work.
There were many things that I was attracted to, I chose to focus on the interplay of colour and the ‘dancing’ relationship of the figures’ hands within the work.
For some years I have been a regular visitor to Wales; to the countryside around Ogmore Vale where my partner lives. When I first started to spend long periods of time there, I could not stop painting the colour relationships I found in the landscape. I saw these same hues again in Verocchio’s painting so I proposed showing some of these at Oriel Davies. Specifically, choosing paintings that might read something like colour samples, a palette from which to recreate Tobias and the Angel.
I then went on to create a new work, a wallpaper design from two wooden mannequin hands. One hand much larger than the other both tentatively reaching out to touch each other. While they are nothing like the hands Verocchio painted I hope they have a similar tenderness.
