Dreaming Of Le Gibet: hallucinatory works by British artist James Dean Diamond

Inspired by the music of the French classical composer Joseph-Maurice Ravel (1875–1937) and, in particular, his piano piece ‘Gaspard de la Nuit’ (‘The Keeper of the Night’), the haunting images aim to parallel the obscure nature of dreams. Similarly, Diamond’s approach to creating atmospheric harmonies, instrumental textures and effects are in line with Ravel’s spatial models of time.

Using the urban environs as the subject to illustrate a state of mind, the artwork oscillates between figuration and abstraction. Rather than employ digital methods, Diamond conceives the work in film, with formal rigour, over a period of five years.

Shooting in London and Paris, he begins the process by assessing the surroundings in order to calculate the distribution of light from each surface. The camera is repositioned, slowing with multiple exposures – up to 200 exposures within a single frame – and structures, constructions, surfaces, space and scale are overlaid to make a ‘unified composition’. The results are both eerie and beautiful in equal measure.

Dreaming Of Le Gibet runs from 25 April - 4 May 2018 at 12 Star Gallery, Europe House, Westminster, London.