Caroline Banks

Caroline has always lived and worked in art and design. Both her English father and French mother nurtured her interest in the arts from a very young age. 

In 2001, she packed her bags to go to India for a year with an NGO to work on a wild silk project with illiterate weavers and her life changed forever. The state of Bihar, the birthplace of Buddhism exposed Caroline to the many other belief systems and made it a reflective time for her both personally as well as artistically. 

Caroline continued working in India, China and Vietnam until her return to the UK at the end of 2007 and is now based in London

She uses the expressive and gestural quality of brush, gesso and ink with gilding and piercing in her explorations into the fluid and fugitive nature of memory, bearing witness to the passage of time. Some pieces can appear almost archaeological, surviving fragments from an unknown past.

The Zen circle is a key element in her visual vocabulary which she returns to repeatedly. Other elements in her language are almost calligraphic, the marks and rhythms inspired, amongst other sources, by the conductor Marin Alsop at work in rehearsal, crafting a musical performance.

Chance is an important element of the creative, meditative process with unpredictability playing its ever-present role as in life. She works with her materials on the knife-edge of control; once a mark has been made it cannot be taken back and the interplay between materials is itself a fascination.  Preparation is lengthy compared to the act of painting which can be very rapid, resembling a performance, with long intervals between layers for reflection. Time itself is an elastic concept in this process.

Her aim is to create contemplative yet celebratory pieces, giving the viewer time for quiet reflection in today’s busy and sensorially bombarded world.