Artist Statement
Paul Sloan’s Animal Kingdom (2020) measures the beauty, absurdity and looming threat of the animal world using the slide rules of grayscale, hermeticism, and anthropomorphic projection. A cat emerges from inky darkness. A long-tailed tit stares at the viewer, poised and knowing. A falcon takes down a surveillance glider. A guard dog bites a well-known gloved hand. A celebrity leaves a vast fortune to his pet, rather than his family or humanitarian organisations. In this new series of paintings, Sloan selects surprising snapshots from our modern world for closer inspection. Using a restrained grayscale palette and his characteristic, wry wit Sloan addresses the addictive nature of modern media as well as what we trust and fear in ourselves and our surroundings.