Melissa Yates
Contemporary Artist
Responding to the values of beauty, goodness and truth present in Nature through the medium of drawing
works
Pencil on Panel
(8 x 10 inches)
Dissolution
Is it Safe?
An Invitation
Where Wisdom Resides
Time Will Tell
Pencil on 360gsm paper
(12 x 16.5 inches)
The Missing Ones
Clouds
Patterns in the Ivy
Between Worlds
I'll Meet You at the Foot of the Tree
about
My work explores how attuning to the natural world can help us make sense of our individual and collective lives. Embracing vulnerability, navigating transitions and engaging with the unknown are current themes.I am interested in what society considers 'valuable' and how our current culture is distorting our innate ability to discern meaningful value, leaving many feeling lost and damaging our living world.My art is an engaged, honest and thoughtful response to the sense of meaning I experience when connecting deeply with the natural world. A school without walls, Nature provides embodied intrinsic value; a grounding force that can help orient us through difficult times and teach us directly about reality.I work in pencil on paper or wooden panel. Simple materials plus sustained attention is a poetic way to cut through the noise of daily life and connect to its 'essence'. By contrast the subject matter can be highly detailed; this speaks to the perception that Nature is complex, relational and interconnected. My process considers both complexity and simplicity and how they coexist.
‘Of what use are poems, or any other works of art unless to enable human lives to be lived with insight of a deeper kind, with more sensitive feelings, more intense sense of the beautiful, with deeper understanding’ - Kathleen Raine