Toucan Space – Stem 2020

Curator: Oh, my. Immediately I’m thinking velvet, heavy drapes, a boudoir in some lost, slightly dusty, fairytale. Editor: We’re looking at “Toucan Space – Stem,” a watercolor piece created in 2020 by Owen Gent. I find it striking how a single, intensely saturated color dominates the entire composition. What about the process itself catches your eye? Curator: The textures created by watercolor are beautiful— that layering effect achieved in such a flat, contained medium. What feels dreamlike and distant up close becomes bold in the aggregate. Did the artist build those layers, or subtract, in a more unpredictable fashion? Editor: It is precisely the controlled application of watercolors, and likely the use of masking techniques that brings me to consider labor here. The image hovers between mass production and unique creation, no? Curator: Indeed. It feels vaguely familiar—almost botanical print-like—but also wholly abstract. Those bulbous, heavy shapes recall petals but morph into something else. There's a disquieting ambiguity; this single flower looks pregnant with meaning I can’t grasp. Editor: Well, a print suggests consumption. What about the material cost? Is it economical for an artist like Gent, and who then consumes the image itself? Its organic theming in a contemporary context opens all these paths. Curator: Paths indeed. Do you think its “modernist” categorisation confines its freedom to grow? What can that tell us? Maybe the real ‘stem’ isn’t so organic…but one we have manufactured for the artist. Editor: You present a compelling contradiction there. Looking closely at those deep reds and dusky oranges though...it reminds me of terracotta production, the social history of materials that surround us—vessels and other wares meant to contain life itself. Curator: And that is a nice place to leave the artwork, a materialised interpretation, still expanding.