Anglesey-based artist, Andy Dobbie, creates colourful, geometrically fragmented paintings in oils and acrylics and bold, angular welded metal sculptures inspired by the human figure to investigate how we see, and understand, three dimensional 'form' in the physical world around us.
His work examines the way light strikes the planes of a figure; how the figure casts shadows on itself and its surroundings; how the shape of the figure creates negative space within and around itself; how movement around the figure changes our perception of these shapes, shadows and negative spaces; and, finally, how we interpret this complexity of visual signals to build a mental picture of the form of the figure and our orientation to it within a Cartesian space.
The human figure, being both infinitely variable and also instantly recognisable (assuming a few hints and clues are proffered), makes an ideal motif because it can be simplified and distorted whilst still remaining identifiable.
Concepts that have inspired Andy's approach to his work include;
• The Modernist period of art, especially the Cubist and Vorticist art movements;
• David Hockney's various discussions about the dominance of the 'monocular view' in art, together with his experiments with photographic 'joiners';
• The course on 'Visual Perception and the Brain' by Dale Purves MD, particularly the section on the 'The Inverse Problem' as it relates to optics;
• E.H. Gombrich's use of the phrase 'schema and correction' in his book, 'Art and Illusion';
The classic Father Ted sketch where he tries to explain to a confused looking Father Dougal that the toy plastic cow Ted holds in his hands is 'very small' whilst the real cow on a distant hillside is 'very far away'!