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From afar you can see two coots, floating among the reeds. But from up close, the depiction in the painting Meerkoet in het Haagse Bos (2023) by Luke McCowan (1998) appears to have dissolved into nothing but paint. Meandering, seemingly haphazard brushstrokes, and bright yellow and white flecks of paint have been applied to the surface in puddles, sometimes rock solid, at other times resembling a transparent hue. With your nose touching the canvas, as it were, the coots seem to have been an illusion, a depiction you thought you saw, but then disappeared.
McCowan’s paintings are visualizations of his fascination with nature. He wants to offer the spectator the experience of completely submerging themselves in nature, just like the depiction in the paint. He first experienced nature in this way in the United States, where he spent his early childhood surrounded by forests and close to one of the largest freshwater lakes in the world. When he later moved to Switzerland, he felt embraced by the majestic Alps. In the Netherlands the presence of nature was substituted for a more urban, people-oriented environment. In his paintings, McCowan wants to bridge the gap between these two realities with the aim of offering a new perspective on both contemporary painting and classical landscapes. His recent works are based on close-up photographs of water, taken in the surroundings of his current place of residence, The Hague. By capturing the endless complexity of the rippling water and emphasizing the reflections and hazy atmosphere, he visualizes concepts of time and tranquillity.
Text: Esther Darley
Translated from Dutch by Marie Louise Schoondergang (The Art of Translation)