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| Lamentation Portal 2017, pastel, graphite, colored pencil and acrylic on paper 9 x 12 3/8 in. (sheet: 13 1/8 x 16 in.) |
Lamentation Portal |
In 2000 I began what would subsequently be my 2000-2007 painting, Lamentation Triptych. The painting began with two separate ideas. The first, which later became its center panel, was based on the Lamentation Portal (preliminary sketch). In it I explored an image of a wall constructed out of prone, decaying, and intertwined human figures with a portal located its center. The second, which later became the side panels, was an image of a figure with his head bowed, weeping into a cloth while standing within the embrace of spiraling tree branches. |
 2000 - 2007, acrylic on canvas overall 66 x 150 in. (center panel 66 x 78 in.; side panels 66 x 36 in.) |
During the process of developing the ideas I decided to merge them. I did this because I recognized how the depth of the landscape space in the side panels represented a transcendent space similar to the portal. And because I thought the removal of the portal would allow me to focus on the unrelenting horror of a solid wall of decaying figures, which would enhance the power of the triptych. All this led me to omit the portal from the painting, but at the same time retain the light source at the center, which illuminates the scene giving it an otherworldly glow. |
 2000/2017, graphite on paper 7 3/4 x 9 3/4 in. (sheet: 9 x 12 in.) |
 1998, graphite on paper 8 x 3 3/4 in. |
10 years later, in 2017, after revisiting the 2000 preliminary sketch, I recognized that the original idea of using the portal was still a viable image to explore, independent of its original relationship to the painting. It was then that I decided to do a finished drawing of the Lamentation Portal. |
 2017, pastel, graphite, colored pencil and acrylic on paper 9 x 12 3/8 in. (sheet: 13 1/8 x 16 in.) |
Today I see the finished drawing of Lamentation Portal as a complex yet minimal piece. Complex in its visually intricate and dense array of intertwined corpses, and minimal in its use of only two basic elements – the wall and the portal landscape. Symbolically the wall of figures represents the pain and suffering of our earthbound existence, while at the same time acts as a barrier that prevents us from moving beyond it. The portal on the other hand, with its clear blue sky and calm tranquil sea, represents a spiritually transcendent space – full of hope, serving as an escape from the challenges of life. - Brian Mains, March 2021 |