CIRCULAR is a new body of work that digs into familiar notions of abstraction – kinetic, playful, awkward spaces, almost-colours and tangled layers. Abstraction is a cycle within a cycle. In production, the image meets the eye, which sends the hand to update the image. In completion, it is a set of ideas that have been thought before, derived through history and pressed anew onto the canvas. Abstraction keeps turning away from you, un-attainable. A painting practice feeds on itself, gathering momentum, borrowing from here and there, constructing, then failing and then building again. The machine requires tending, and stoking, like a mini circular economy. The paintings are the remnant of this shambolic making. Ellinger’s work is a homage to abstraction and its potential to renew and truthfully reflect human experiences.
