REBECCA HARPER
THE WATERS OF DWELLING

For Harper, making these paintings through a deeply personal lens became an opportunity to examine a period of rapid global change, acknowledging an individual and worldly capacity to live at the edge of the precipice. One which involves all of us dealing with the extreme challenges presented to us through the ensuing uncertain and unsettled. She references what Freud refers to as the ‘Death of Eros’ where the great undercurrents of human experience are hopelessly locked in a perpetual state of battle, with opposing forces constantly at play. We all must attempt to steer our ship and avoid drowning in the complex dichotomous waters of freedom and constraint, strength and vulnerability, kindness and hate, constructive and destructive, dark and light and ultimately life and death. Attempting to not become overwhelmed, avoiding the deluge, as the tide rises.

In a prosaic sense the river became symbolic of the artists home, located at the water’s edge, but in a more profound sense, as the exhibition title alludes, it also carries wider and deeper references. We see rivers flow, clouds rain, and rainwater dissipate, nourishing and accommodating us and other objects, and on a more personal level we see tears fall and water slip through fingers. The ritualistic nature of water helps to cleanse, heal, bless, and purify, and through this it connects us to ourselves, others, to life and to earth – it is a unifying element. Harper says "I’ve been thinking about our acts of effortless surrender to the natural cycles of the world. We are reminded that the water accommodates us, we are supported, we are not resisted, it sustains us, cleanses us and we are weightless to it."

Much like in the ideas of the Tao in Chinese philosophy, the route of water explores alignment with the rhythms of the elements both within and outside the body. The ebb and flow of 'The Rivers of Dwelling' inspires immersion for both loosing and finding the self again as part of a greater whole. We become a part of the water as the water is a part of us, conjoining our inner and outer physical worlds in metaphysical unity. There is a surrendering to nature as an opening for wider thought and a deeper searching for connection.

The main protagonist of many of these paintings, has become a kind of guiding spirit of self, an avatar for the artist in a constant stream of uncertainty, as Harper says "she's quite reliable and she turns up again and again when I need her, this reoccurring blond figure, the guiding spirit of me, is a reminder of the cycles of life, strength and rebirth: she is still very present and helps to carry the load.”

Harper has spoken of water as an element of ritual purification, citing the Jewish Mikvah – a deep pool in which women traditionally immerse prior to marriage and which can also mark moments of transition or transformation. In Reconnecting with Eros and Rivers of Dwelling the female character appears suspended blissfully in water alongside a barely visible man. Part Harper, she is also a hybrid of stylised references including Munch’s Madonna (1894-5), and the sensual, tragic Pre Raphaelite sisterhood (can you immerse a British woman in a river and escape Ophelia, with all her associations with the tragic and erotic?)

Like the statuesque figure standing apart in Paula Rego’s The Dance (1988) Harper’s blonde woman often performs as an intermediary between the painting and the space beyond. In both The Loss of Eros and The Watch Tower, her direct gaze invites us into the theatre of action, to become part of an unfolding drama.

Achelous and Suda are not lovers, but a character and his author: the shape-shifting river god of ancient Greece and a Byzantine encyclopaedia named for the writer Soudas. Harper aligns herself with a tradition of mystical and unreal riverscapes, from Classical antiquity to the emotionally turbulent, colour-saturated paintings of Marianne von Werefkin, Gabriele Münter and the Blue Rider group. Purifying, reflecting, supporting, the river acts as a boundary to the intimate world of the paintings, but it is also an emblem of continuity and endurance.

Hettie Judah: Water plays a role in almost all of these paintings: it’s a constant presence in Old Isleworth, which is on the Thames, but does the water have symbolic qualities as well?

Rebecca Harper: The river location is important because it’s symbolic of home. The title ‘The Waters of Dwelling’ carries references to the rain, the Mikvah 1 , the womb, the ritual of water that helps to cleanse, heal and purify the body, and through this it connects us to ourselves, others, to life, to earth. So the water has become symbolic of rebirth, lifecycles, courage, power, truth, strength and spirituality.

The mood of the weather has played such a huge part in all of these paintings symbolically and is suggestive of events playing out. In this series of water based paintings, on a macro level we see rivers flow, clouds rain, and rainwater dissipate and accommodate us and other objects, and on a micro level we see tears fall, water slip through our fingers, and run through our thighs. The idea being that one who lives in accordance with nature does not go against the way of things.

Hettie Judah: And the water performs as a supportive substance. In The Rivers of Dwelling and Reconnecting with Eros there’s a sense that the figures are lifted and carried by the water.

Rebecca Harper: I’ve been thinking about our acts of effortless surrender to the natural cycles of the world. We are reminded that the water accommodates us, we are supported, we are not resisted, it sustains us, cleanses us, and we are weightless to it.

Much like in the ideas of the Tao in Chinese philosophy, the route of water explores alignment with the rhythms of the elements both within and outside the body. The Rivers of Dwelling is about immersion for healing: Reconnecting with Eros is very much about the ebb and flow, of both loosing and finding the self again.

Hettie Judah: Can you talk me through the characters that appear in the paintings?

Rebecca Harper: There is a recurring cast of characters who move around often in my work. I never see the characters as portraits as such, more like actors that play a role, filling in for particular people on stage. This big blonde-haired lady has become a kind of guiding spirit of myself: she represents polarities of vulnerability and strength. She’s a stronger me: in a time of uncertainty, she’s quite reliable and she turns up again and again when I need her. There’s also the actor playing the character of my partner who was with my family during the lockdown period: he’s present and witness to all of this. And there are some that touch upon other family members, my brother and my mother.

Hettie Judah: The blonde woman seems to draw together elements from different characters through art history: she’s stylised and looks slightly unreal. What other paintings or artists have you been looking to?

Rebecca Harper: I think, like the river that I’ve seen most days, everything I look at enough seems to seep into my work. For that reason [J.M.W.] Turner’s sketchbooks of this part of the river have been so interesting. I’ve been looking at [Edvard] Munch a lot, mostly for his sense of melancholy and depictions of loss and grief. Munch’s questioning and awkwardness has found its way into these paintings. And his Madonna [1894-5] has become a figure in the paintings Reconnecting with Eros. In a way she’s not human anymore, I see her as a spirit, she’s quite ethereal, quite Ophelia-like too. I have a beautiful book of [Claude] Monet’s Water Lilies, which has been out in my studio. There has been a constant dialogue throughout with these particular artists.

Hettie Judah: Objects that seem laden with symbolism accompany the characters: the big trapped spider in Catch; doubled swans in The Watch Tower and Achelous and Suda; rainbows and gridded patterns.

Rebecca Harper: They all have secondary meanings. The spider in Catch represents an undercurrent creeping in, moments of being witness to something more sinister. In The Shell of the Sacred Water the shell is associated with death and rebirth. In Achelous and Suda you find the couple on a balcony under a rainbow, which refers indiscreetly to Covid, and silver linings. The recurring motifs, like crosses or stars are formally a way of thinking about colour and moving the eye around the image: they’re the reflections of the sun hitting the water, but they’re also about looking for something more spiritual.

Hettie Judah: A heightened sense of boundaries was such a powerful phenomenon of this period: of the home and of the self, and staying within those boundaries to be safe. The Watch Tower feels like a moment of standing guard against invasion from the outside world. I was interested that you’ve used this framing of the window with the cross shaped wrought-iron pattern in Achelous and Suda, so you see the world beyond through that grid.

Rebecca Harper: There are boundaries, perimeters, safety nets, particularly in The Watch Tower where the figures holding binoculars huddle on the lookout in an imaginary tree house fortress, like a form of surveillance. There are also resin security cameras placed throughout the show.

I spent so much of lockdown looking out of that balcony onto the river. I feel incredibly lucky to have had that view. But that wrought iron star motif on the balcony, you’re right, has become the grid over all the river paintings, it’s almost like the stars are about protection as well.

Hettie Judah: A lot of radiant light goes through these paintings – it’s a little psychedelic, but also intensifies their spiritual aspect, like light through stained glass, or the visionary pictures of William Blake. You have gravitated towards a very stylised colour palette.

Rebecca Harper: Unconsciously there has been an intense saturation in the palette. I had been thinking about [Marc] Chagall and Blake too at points, where the colour is certainly a manifestation of the inner and outer world.

Hettie Judah: Mourning and loss also run through these works – What you Wished and Wished Away recalls the performance of an elegiac act. There’s also a painting in the series, which looks down to a coffin. Grief can be such a difficult subject – giving painted expression to an absence or loss – how did you go about addressing it?

Rebecca Harper: As many people have, I’ve myself been dealing with various types of loss in my life lately, consequently I’ve been reflecting, and viewing the world in a way I hadn’t previously. This body of work during lockdown became much more inward-looking as our worlds grew smaller. Through loss and grief, the search for meaning and the need for solace and reconnecting with myself grew greater than ever. So the reoccurring blond figure, the guiding spirit of me, is a reminder of the cycles of life, strength and rebirth: she is still very present and helps to carry the load.