'Bloom' - Wade Taylor

Bloom explores the relationship between painting and the film image, between personal memory and its connection with the histories of those who are strangers. Working from a long-ago acquired collection of 35mm Kodachrome film slides kept in repository, Wade interprets images and worlds that he has had no direct experience with. Locations, subjects and time periods are unknown but through the process of painting the subjects take on a personal dimension, borrowing memories and elaborating, editing, and drawing out narrative. This is a process of restoring life to forgotten histories, but an imprecise one; the image is always inconclusive. The works fluctuate between representation and abstraction, frustrating the narrative and emphasising the unknowable nature of the image. Employing the saturated palette of the Kodachrome process, Bloom draws on the cyclic themes of renewal and death inherent with lives lived in fullness, that may just as soon be relegated to obscurity or basement storage.