The Three Selves

“This life drawing, inspired by an image featured in “Yummy” magazine, portrays three men messing around by a lake and pushing the central man into the water. Conceptually, for me it represents much more, explored through the paradigm of the psyche. The figure on the left personifies one’s public persona, well formed, lacking visible imperfections, and intentionally contained – hence the continuous black outline. The person on the right portrays the internal conscious self, which is well formed but rough around the edges, also allowing room for growth and evolution – hence the exaggerated cut-away abdomen. The figure in the centre represents the unconscious or “shadow self”, to use a Jungian term, which the two conscious parts are somehow trying the reject – hence the greyscale colour choices. Yet, for the psyche to exist, all three parts rely on each other equally to maintain themselves as a collective whole – therefore, the colourful figures are standing on greyscale wooden beams, and vice versa. The exposed charcoal under-drawing at the end of one of the wooden beams represents the idea that the development of the self never ends.”

Charcoal and soft pastel on Lenox fine art paper, 56cm x 76cm, 2025