Folk Apparition

An array of old and new work was on display at Jack Duplock's most recent exhibition, and it wasn't difficult to detect which was the former. 'Will I Die Today Or Tomorrow. I Just Can't Say' was the oldest piece, created several years ago; an indicator of how his work has become progressively more in-depth in terms of its meaning and composition since he executed this painting. His more recent works reveal a hint of perspective, given tentatively to the relatively flat scenes which dominate his earlier works. But a lingering preoccupation with future visions, past recollections, horror film imagery and vintage pop culture are firmly retained.

Like fluorescent obituaries of youth cults passed, his collaged paintings evoke a 1970s nostalgia of psychedelic, heavy metal and B-movie references. His paintings are stagnated embodiments of things lost to the past, unattainable but imprinted indelibly on the memory; the stuff of fearful dreams and alluring nightmares. His former work, of two-dimensional landscapes and obsessive detail, have a – dare we say it – folk art feel, while in the more recent work there is, contradictorily,