Your move

Sketches view

This painting is a bit complicated but in brief we have poor one side and rich on the other. After working out what image represents which chess piece you'll see that the rich can check mate in one move, but looking a bit deeper you'll see that the poor can also check mate in one move? So who's move is it? Well we  have  the answer in the title. For a more in-depth write up click MORE INFO

Details

Title: Your Move, Medium: Oils, Size 1285x840, Surface; canvas, Painted: 1991

Sale Options

Original: not for sale

Copy's: Size 300x200mm (A4) = £5.00 or 400x300mm (A3) = £8.00 plus post. 

Limited 1st edition signed copy's: Size 300x200mm (A4) = £15.00 or 400x300mm (A3) = £18.00 plus post. 

You may have a copy of the poem at the bottom of the image.                 

Your move sketches

These sketches are many moons old. They seem to show what I'm trying to capture for this very important painting.  My drawing skills and painting skill are still at their early birth, but these images would not leave my imagination, so here we have a collection of sketches from my late teens.

Poem

by Gail Wakeham

The sky has been broken by Gods almighty bang

To show the wonders of new worlds and try to shake up man

On the faces of the helpless a sight that they abhor

The annoyance and the anger of a God who’s been ignored

We have missiles and bombs and mountains of food

The third world is starving but mountains can’t move

There’s poor and there’s needy in faraway lands

Who have hunger and famine they don’t understand

How red tape and religion can perform hand in hand

And the game is still played by rules made by man

Giving thoughts to the future and what plagues us today

Won’t solve all our problems if they’re buried away

Our children of today are here for our tomorrow

To clear away the mess and bring hope instead of sorrow

So a plea from the needy their fates in our grasp

Mistakes from the past will just linger and last

To those who have power and positions of trust

It’s time for a change and do it we must

The artist has painted an image of a game

Do the rich move or the poor the outcome is the same

In the Equation of life someone has to win or lose

So the title of his painting is YOUR MOVE

More info

This painting has a lot to say, many times I have tried to write the meaning behind all the images. Below is my best try so far. Firstly I'll try and explain how as a very young teenager I was influenced by the images around me, this sparked off a young mind and the reason for all that you view within the painting. 

I was a young apprentice decorator when I was working in some offices that belonged to a church organization. While trying to impress a nice young female, I noticed on her computer screen a large set of numbers, something like so, "£200000000000000"? I asked, "is that the churches income?" "some of it", she replied. Not so long after this, on our TV's, we had all these images of starving children and their mums, grandpas grandmas and dads from somewhere in Africa. Next thing we have man going into space to reach the moon at a great cost. Also at this time I was reading about these so called food mountains stored everywhere.

 Now I am not a wise man but my very young untrained mind could not understand how with all this wealth swimming around us, we have entire families starving, dying and living in terrible conditions. 

On reflection this is like some game these great organizations and politicians are playing and we the norm are just like pawns that move here and there according to their view of things at the time.

So this painting represents my view of how things looked  to a young man.

THE PAINTING

We have a hole in the sky at the top left, This is gods thump of anger  showing us his universe and the wonders of many worlds to come for us, if we don't spOIL this one.

Below this hole you see his forceful crack streaking down the sky across the mountain along the land, showing our faults in burying our nuke waste under mother earth, his crack continues en route over to the board, encircling the church figures and the politicians, trying to shake his warning into them, life is not a game it is life..

On the left we have lovely green fertile land, great trees and livestock grazing, in the distance you see food storage buildings with yearly dates, like a reverse mirror image across to the right you see dried cracking unfertile dusty land, dead trees, people carrying dead and dying friends and family to be buried, opposite those food storage buildings we have millions of mouths waiting for food to survive.

At the back of the game board on the side of the poor we have a wooden structure, they are trying to bridge the gap. On the rich side we have a sign, saying " new bridge under construction" with a sicker across it saying, "delayed until further notice."

On the game board, the rich have men in pin striped suits, these are the pawns doing what they need to do to keep the game moving. Then we have the missile which represents the army or knight in this game keeping the power in force. There is the office block their castles keeping the red tape flowing. At the middle of this is the king of business who helps keep the balance of riches coming in their direction. The bishop in his robe of gold with his eyes closed and the queen size pile of politicians talking, listening and piling more and more red tape around the situation.

On the poor side we have two kid's trying to keep there faith upright in the cross of their king. Their castle is some make shift bits to cover their young future. Their pawn's sitting helpless not knowing what to do. The aid worker in the distance is their bishop doing what he can with his hands tied with red tape. The last is their knight with enough strength to throw a stone in anger.

The board on the rich side shows their wealth in the marble squares and gold rim. On the poor side we have wood squares and a stone rim, to them that is their riches.

Above in the clouds we have the next generation looking down in disbelief,  two stand helpless and one trying to put the world back together, what a task we leave them.

If you have any knowledge of chess you will see that from the position of the rich pieces they can check mate next move. If you look harder you'll also see that the poor can check mate next move.

This brings up the question who's move is it, well the title says it all.

This might be the most complex painting I might ever paint in my lifetime, I hope it helps in a little way.