Imogen Allen is a painter whose work explores the energetic terrain of our conscious and subconscious experience through the physical language of colour, shape and gesture. Her paintings are luminous, meditative portals of reflection, which embrace the physicality of our earth as a pathway to the spiritual, transcendental experience.
Having grown up near Zennor, South West Cornwall, on the edge of a moorland of lichen blanketed standing stones and ethereal grasses, Allen sees the human relationship to wildness, as central to the architecture of our being. Her work is informed deeply by this profound connection to the voices of the natural world; the characteristics of plants, fungi and the elements constantly inform the direction of her paintings. Imogen intends each work to possess its own distinct personality and explore its own painterly terrain, like each organism within the ecosystem. The thread which unifies her work is something ineffable, but can be felt through characteristics of sensitive touch, vivid colour and shifting depth that permeate her canvases.
You say your work explores ‘the energetic terrain of our conscious and subconscious experience,’ can you explain why this is of interest to you?
I am interested in how the work can touch someone on an energetic level, a level which is of pure feeling, which goes beyond language. When I say both the conscious and the subconscious experience I am referring to the different levels of self. These are not purely abstract paintings. Although they tend towards abstraction they reference subjects which hold a deep respect for our collective unconscious. Butterfly wings are highly symbolic subject matter, yet I haven chosen to approach them from a different perspective. Instead of illustrating the symbol, I hope to convey a deeply sensual experience of them.
I work with the viscerality of paint directly. When the viewer meet the shapes and colours head on, I hope they meet them in a way that is unadulterated by any fixed narrative, instead leaning into the fluidity of the work. Perhaps they are then flooded with these interpretations after - and at that point the viewer has the energy to hold their psyche in a new way. My intention for the work is that of a vessel. Zooming in on detail and perspective helps me disorientate and forge a fresh interpretation. My primary aim is to encourage people to see and experience the world in colour, shape and sensation before attempting to define it. So many of us live in the idea of the world instead of the world itself. I hope my work can awaken the viewer into a fluid, wave-like experience. I have been very inspired by meditative traditions in the moulding of these intentions in my work.
You’re communicating a ‘pathway to the spiritual’ with your work. Can you expand upon your connection to the earth, in a spiritual sense?
Ever since I was a child, I’ve felt a deep sensitivity and connection to nature. Nature has always been the pathway into the creative experience for me. The diversity and complexity found in the natural world is a product of deep evolutionary time, imparting natural structures and colours a depth beyond their surface level beauty. Whether I am painting an abstraction of a butterfly wing, lichen or a seaweed, I am driven by the sensation of awe and mystery one encounters when in nature. These abstract sensations are more important to me than the ‘what’ that prompts the painting. These ‘ineffable’ feelings are understood across mystical traditions as the access point to the spiritual realm, or God. I think we have a lot to learn from ancient spiritual traditions, in which the earth is often the doorway into the divine. Our entire western system is built largely on the separation of us from the earth. I think painting has the unique capacity to bridge the earth, the body and the mind and facilitate a more fluid orientation to our consciousness.
I’ve always moved through the landscape and related to it in very intimate, interpersonal way. This sensitivity is rooted in Cornwall where I live and work, but I have found it whilst travelling across the world in different biospheres too. When I was in Brazil on a residency a couple of years ago I thought about this a lot in relation to the forest. Small observed moments: like the light pouring through the vein of a leaf or the light reflecting off a moss on a tree, expand holistically into worlds themselves. It seems paradoxical, but I’ve found when we go inwards on a granular level we gain access to something that is frequently more expansive.
Lot 165. Imogen Allen - Untitled
You use vibrant colour in your paintings – how do you decide your palette for your pieces, is it taken from real observances of nature or more instinctive?
Colour is the driving force of all of my works. I aim to convey the same inner luminosity that we experience when we see the vivid oranges of a lichen or the purple in the wing of a butterfly in the wild. They are always inspired by the palate of something that already exists, but the process of making the work will often slightly alter this palette. I want each colour to be felt in itself but also deep interconnected relationship to the other colours in the painting. As my work evolves I feel an affinity between the colours I use and the frequencies and sensations in my own body. I think individual colours have equivalent sensations as they are also frequencies of energy. I want the experience of feeling and looking at the work to be cleansing, as the viewer is able to move through different frequencies of themselves.
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Questions by Kate Reeve Edwards
