Alex Echo: Water

After a hugely successful exhibition last year, contemporary artist Alex Echo returns to London with a brand new collection of his unique resin coated paintings.

This new exhibition features over 90 paintings and has been inspired by the many identities of water. To Alex the transitional nature of water is fascinating. Gently rippling lakes freeze into ice ponds that will begin to crack and splinter when the sun’s warmth coaxes the frozen mass back into liquid form. Water can both softly simmer and boil ferociously, eventually leaving none of its former self behind, as it makes its steamy ascent towards the heavens. As beautiful as it is deadly; as constant and reliable as it is unpredictable and transient, it is elemental, yet complicated. Both friend and foe, neither ally nor enemy exclusively. In abundance it floods and destroys, in scarcity it ravages and brings us to our knees.

Water has inspired many a poem, painting, and music; but why? Is it because water is our main component, coursing through our bodies, sustaining us and powering the physiology that allows these works to be created by the human hand? Is it because we realise we are neither its master nor its slave, and thus seek to reconcile the hierarchy, taking ownership of this powerful element by ‘capturing’ it in artistic mediums? Perhaps it is purely because water has been responsible for some of the greatest wonders of the natural world, by far more beautiful and beyond the realms of anything manmade. Thus water becomes our challenge, our raison d’être as evolved beings. If one can harness water as a subject, show it due respect and justify the hubris with an end result worthy of the undertaking, have we transcended the natural order?

Water by Alex Echo can be seen at Castle Fine Art, Mayfair from 9th February.