In Deluge, Lorraine Rastorfer investigates the role of water and liquidity both as an element and in the physical creation of a painting. Moving on from her previous examination of air as a shaping force, the works in Deluge are flooded with pearlescent paint. Rastorfer determines the overall process but allows serendipity to direct where pigment pools and settles. The marks left behind create a “map of ebbing and flowing” (1) and reveal the painterly process behind the making of each work.

While emphasis on the medium is obvious in a work such as Sluice, the marks created by Rastorfer’s technique also create tonal depths that advance and recede. Delicate webs of texture are enhanced by the play of light and dark within and across the work, creating an atmospheric landscape, albeit one that we are aware has been altered from its original state.

Rastorfer invites the viewer to consider not only the process of her work, but to also think about the layering and manipulation of surfaces. The lustre possessed by these latest works is more than a rich surface or a decorative façade; Rastorfer wants us to feel what lies beneath, behind and between her subtle layers and organic forms.

1. Lorraine Rastorfer, Artist Statement, 2011.