The artwork of Nerina Lascelles invites viewers to reach beyond wave forms and cloud forms and ranges of mist obscured mountains, beyond rocky summits, precipitous slopes and shadowy ravines, toward depths of field within which a spacious luminescence holds sway.
One senses however that we are not entering a landscape of this world, for earth, water and vapour appear disembodied somehow, and either becalmed or drifting in a state of suspended motion. All is tranquil and raised to a heightened significance, and this would be the limit of the experience, were it not for the quality of light.
According to a deeply rooted sympathy, we feel more than usually drawn, as though the depth of field so skilfully portrayed in each painted landscape were resonating with landscapes of heightened significance within, from the depths of which light flows forth from the centre of our being.
If that light could speak, it might speak of the marriage of remoteness and intimacy. It might speak of a harmony uniting inner and outer worlds, or it might repeat the poetic observations of enlightened sages:
Only the inner light illuminates eternity
Only that light can guide us back home
Lao Tzu, c. 5th-century BC
The paintings can act as sadhanas, or objects for meditation, that invite us to reinhabit the luminous stillness at our core.