VIEW IN MY ROOM
Austria
Painting, Oil on Canvas
Size: 39.3 W x 39.3 H x 1.2 D in
Ships in a Crate
Every year I try to create an image which will be reproduced as a Christmas card. I love to paint angels as they belong to many different religious traditions and belief systems, although in Europe, where I live they are most closely and most recently identified with Christianity. I was brought up in a rather secular environment and often felt excluded by by the 'mystery' that my religious friends and acquaintances seemed to take altogether too for granted, but what little Christian influence that came to me via school and the media, fascinated and engaged me in the same way that films and television and literature did, as something I was somehow privileged to be exposed to. I wanted this image to recall the ideas I had about Christmas as a child. We all know by now that Jesus's birth most probably took place in the middle of spring and that middle eastern landscapes look very different from those of my childhood in England, but the imagery of our early years is very powerful and I think speaks to all of our hearts more directly than authenticity, logic and historical detail. The title is ironically intended; stolen, as it is from the well known Anthony Gormley Sculpture in Gateshead, a fine example of what our modernist sensibilities have taught us to expect from contemporary art. My understanding of angels in northern Europe is rather less original and comes from a place of sentiment and nostalgia and also from the 'imaginal world' where archetypes live eternally. I hope that this picture will be enjoyed in the spirit of remembering something which perhaps never existed but maybe, out to have done.
Painting:Oil on Canvas
Original:One-of-a-kind Artwork
Size:39.3 W x 39.3 H x 1.2 D in
Frame:Not Framed
Ready to Hang:Not applicable
Packaging:Ships in a Crate
Delivery Time:Typically 5-7 business days for domestic shipments, 10-14 business days for international shipments.
Handling:Ships in a wooden crate for additional protection of heavy or oversized artworks. Crated works are subject to an $80 care and handling fee. Artists are responsible for packaging and adhering to Saatchi Art’s packaging guidelines.
Ships From:Austria.
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Austria
Ben Dhaliwal’s artwork belongs to a world of atmosphere, narrative and above all nostalgia, perhaps for something never experienced. His landscapes and interiors are populated by archetypal figures. Magicians, Clowns, Kings, Queens, Angels, Performing Animals and characters from and inspired by his love of baroque opera. All of them have in common that they are figures out of place in the modern, materialist world. His performers stand as practitioners of either lost, pointless or superseded skills; much like any painter, especially one occupied with representational or figurative subject matter. The situations in which they are depicted are often either prior to or after an event to which the viewer has not been privileged and must therefore provide interpretation and meaning. Clues and symbols abound in the plethora of seemingly irrelevant objects which lie discarded in the corners and shadows of his theatrical spaces. His paintings are also rich in art historical references contrasted by deliberate anachronisms of textile, costume detail and furnishing. These are there to be enjoyed by those who care to take the time but are non-essential and subservient to the overall effect. The kitsch and sentimental content in his work is neither cool nor ironic but stems from a real desire to transcend and escape the sometimes oppressive hectic of the immediate. As a child of mixed-race parentage growing up in the grim, industrial north of 1970’s England, he claimed this right to non-participation relatively early, abandoning a practical study of art for the more esoteric but academically rigorous and critical theory-steeped, art history. Emerging years later, his head spinning with visual and cultural references, he embarked on a career as a museum curator. However, dissatisfied with the dreary politics and repetitive administration and having met his wife to be, he left England for Austria, initially planning to begin doctoral research. However, during this time, his desire to practice was re-kindled. After a brief and only partially successful attempt to try and establish a career as a children’s book illustrator, he began to practice the meticulous, studied and utterly un-spontaneous type of oil painting, based on the so called ‘Flemish Technique’ that he had always admired. Lacking conviction that his work had either aesthetic merit or commercial possibility, he did not exhibit until 2013.
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