Curatorial reading

The work draws on the ancient motif of katabasis: a descent into the underworld undertaken in search of knowledge, recovery or transformation. The composition is divided between an upright portrait and its inverted counterpart beneath the waterline. Fish move through the submerged realm while the golden oval above suggests a portal, sun or halo. The mirrored figure can be read as the hidden, unconscious or transformed self encountered through descent.

Relationship to The Spaces Between

The painting visualises a threshold between surface and depth, consciousness and the unconscious, life and symbolic death. It suggests that transformation requires movement through what cannot be fully known or controlled.