SALLY BOURKE TEMPEST

'Tempest' Exhibition Statement

“A tempestuous noise of thunder and lightning heard.”
– Act 1, Scene 1, The Tempest, William Shakespeare, 1607-1611

Sally Bourke’s Tempest is about love, loss and weathering the storm. In the same way that Shakespeare plunged his audiences into the tempestuous eye of the storm in his 17th Century play, Bourke draws viewers into a deep storm of her own making. Torrential rain falls across sullen faces and mingles with tears; Bourke’s paintings evoke emotions that are as mercurial as the stormy weather her figures are situated within. Through the alchemy of painting, Bourke emulates water’s seemingly magical power of transmutation and invites us to enter the tempest and emerge transformed.