image/jpeg | May 31, 2025 at 6:34 PM | 20 edition(s)

Mesh painting by Chris Follows, created with p5.js with AI code assistant. Type jpg Dimensions 8000 x 8000 300dpi ‘I SLEEP BUT I MUST WAKE UP’ By Chris Follows, June 2025 Special edition Mesh Painting series, ‘I SLEEP BUT I MUST WAKE UP’ part of ‘War, My Love’ Group exhibition curated by KANT. For this series, I reflect and question my own personal responsibility to how I respond to clear and explicit horrors and atrocities of ongoing wars and the intolerable suffering of others. Having not personally experienced the devastating impacts of war and conflict, making work about war is a creative challenge. On many levels, my everyday response to war can feel totally inadequate. Conversely, I’m continually bemused by a perceived majority of silence and apathy to the horrors and atrocities of ongoing wars. My mesh painting process references a similar aesthetic to tapestry and homemade cross stitch. I’ve always been interested in handmade crafts, traditional art and craft movement. The idyllic, carefree cross stitch scene of an ‘English Landscape’ juxtaposed against a stark reminder, to wake up to the atrocities being inflicted on others ‘I SLEEP BUT I MUST WAKE UP’ highlights our vulnerabilities and responsibilities to ongoing global turmoil.