Process : Explorations of the Work of Tim Davies

"Using a retrospective approach, this collection of essays provides an illuminating and informative commentary on the artwork of Tim Davies. Explored are the practice, the international contexts, and the recurring motifs of Davies's art. Davies himself also provides a commentary on five of his significant pieces. Internationally exhibited and acclaimed, Davies utilizes humble, commonplace, or reclaimed materials to make works of art that engage with contemporary issues through a formal and minimal visual language. Discussed is a seminal work in which he laid parquet in the Belizean jungle, and plants then grew through the blocks and termites eroded them. Davies's use of change, both organic and by intervention, is explored."

Tim Davies is one of the most exciting artists working in Britain today. Internationally exhibited and acclaimed, he utilises humble, commonplace or reclaimed materials to make works of art which engage with contemporary issues through a formal and minimal visual language. In a seminal work he relaid parquet in the Belizean jungle (source of the flooring's mahogany). New plants now grow through the hardwood blocks, and termites erode them. In contrast, another reclamationary intervention sees him recover the sound and emotive force of a drum from the cold silence of a bronze statue which glorifies war in a national museum. Change, organic and by intervention, and method are at the centre of Davies' art; process is its determining feature.
In a retrospective approach three leading critics provide an informative commentary on his work. David Alston is Galleries Director at The Lowry in Salford; Iwan Bala is one of Wales' leading artists and critics; Anne Price-Owen is an art historian and founder of the David Jones Society. Together they explore the practice, the international context, the Welsh context and the recurring motifs of Tim Davies' work. Davies' himself also provides a commentary on five of his significant pieces in this ground-breaking book for Welsh art, which also includes a Foreword by Susan Daniel-McElroy, Director of Tate St. Ives.