Exhibition Program

Neville Campbell

Subterranean Crucible

NOTHING BUT DEATH

There are cemeteries that are lonely,

graves full of bones that do not make a sound,

the heart moving through a tunnel,

in it darkness, darkness, darkness,

like a shipwreck we die going into ourselves,

as though we were drowning inside our hearts,

as though we lived falling out of the skin into the soul.

~ PABLO NERUDA

This series follows “Imaginations of Divine Mother” and in a similar vein, awareness of known and unknown is depicted as a woman in the fullness of being. Pablo’s poem provides a hint of a departure. A few grains of sand falling from last Summer’s novel heightens the fragility of last Summer’s song. The whole enchilada implodes, the museum case fractionates namelessly into song. The tale is broken open.

These moments of chaos have their own dance. Groundless, yet seemingly torn between light and dark, the incoming revelations bath the old serpent. Heartache reaches deep inside the wound searching again for the Holy Mother, the Beloved’s face, even if it’s only a reflection. The crucible is timeless. Courage, despair and the shadow of death all find their way here. Longing, vulnerability, and embracing the unknown, somehow provide the fire for this sublime alchemy.

The works are assembled in a much more complex way than in the previous series. They are more like monoprints in that although a similar print could be arrived at, there would be a multitude of subtle differences between each print.