MULTIVERSE F31

(the timeline in which F was born in Italy)

Acrylic on canvas. 1 x 1.2m (39.4 x 47.3 in)

*See the work in progress/time lapse for the first two Multiverse paintings here

The Multiverse project started in the Autumn of 2015.

Camille Walala, Jordy Van Den Nieuwendijk, Lakwena Maciver, Supermundane, Anthony Burrill, Charlie Patterson, David Shillinglaw, Hattie Stewart, Morag Myerscough and myself had been invited by They Made This to produce some artwork to be shown at Protein Gallery and auctioned at Christie's. All the profits were to go to Refuge charity.

Originally I was planning to do a couple of Visual Mantras paintings. Playing with repetition as a way towards trance/meditation, but the restriction of the already decided pattern didn't resonate with me anymore. I felt the process of colouring more or less inside the lines quite rigid and didn't want to move forward with it.

At that point I was reading a few books about Quantum Physics, Dark Matter, Multiverses, supermassive black holes and all that. All mindbending and spellbinding in equal measures :)

I came up with the analogy of a Visual Mantras pattern as a framework that could represent the starting point at the beginning of a person's life—similar to a Natal Chart in astrology!

And I started playing with how much this pattern/set of parameters could vary depending on the choices/events at this persons life (progressions and transits in astrology).
I compared it to the Multiverse theory. So many possibilities and realities can be happening at the same time to the different selves of an individual! I thought of an Ana living in Hawaii and working at a permaculture farm at the same time of another Ana was working in an rural office or yet a different Ana being the mother of baby triplets while living in Asia, ha ha ha.

Triplets apart, so many things can be happening at the same time without us even noticing! Each idea/intention could branch into a new reality. I feel like my human brain can only start to grasp all the possibilities and concepts Physics and Cosmology are theorising but my intention is to keep learning and improving my monkey brain. So much yet to discover!

The process with the Multiverse paintings is to create a fixed pattern each unique individual—the paintings are always titled with a combination of the initials of that person's name and a number representing the Multiverse/variation its represented.

After outlining the pattern I start colouring in an intuitive way the whole canvas. Modifying little or a lot the original pattern and creating the idea of a different reality for that person. Same framework/ background but different evolution/result.

The first two paintings, the ones auctioned at Christie's were inspired on my mother (Maria Isabel) and my grandmother (Francisca).