• Mark Gibson - Statement | CV | Works

I began the body of work titled Afterlife in the Spring of 2008 after the completing the In The Cover of Darkness, which is a series of drawings dealing with animal behavior as it relates to fantasy and sexuality. The first pieces from Afterlife were titled Ghost. In this series, the 'ghost' figure takes the form of the 'iconic ghost' (i.e. a man covered in a sheet). It's an icon, but where does it come from? While I don't know the true origin, my theory is that it came about as a sort of literal interpretation of an afterlife. An attempt to give form to the formless. For a ghost to work you would first have to believe that they are present in the world we know. You would also need to believe that a ghost --even though unseen-- could posses mass or density. Placing a sheet over such a being would shift it almost fully into our 3-D world. What was unseen would be given a visible shape, it would even cast a shadow. I began with illustrations of a figure covered in a sheet.

The ghost figure works as an indicator of another realm, something usually unseen or unseeable. Imagine a sailor crossing a large expanse of water, with no land in sight for miles in all directions. Suddenly in the sky there is a bird, no land --just a bird. "Where did it come from?" "How could it travel so far?" The answer is that the bird's nature allowed it to traverse the distance and now to the sailor appear impossibly lost and out of its element. Is it truly out of its element? No, the bird is in flight and the sailor is merely seeing it in its natural state and the properties that go along with that state. It's also the case with a ghost. The ghost in this scenario has the ability to move from an unknown and into our perception, making it appear out of place.

The cave is my representation of our necessity to believe in a afterlife as an environment. Many people need to believe in a space or some form of containment that represents the three dimensional world we go to exist in when we die. The cave has all of these things. This limited space with light at the end of the tunnel is not the end. My intention is to illustrate that there is something larger and more open beyond that. Something that does not commit itself to our grounded since of logic and reason.

By placing abstract patterns of color on the ghost they become removed from the space in which they inhabit. Their loud color snaps against the, bleak environment. The ghost itself acts as a symbol for the afterlife and not the world it resides in. These works are a visual metaphor for the afterlife. While the cave represents known spaces and ideas that can ground us, where there is a beginning and an end. I believe there is something else beyond our ability to comprehend and the ghosts can lead us there.