ambient painting

Ross Manning’s Ambient Paintings are a series of ongoing works inspired by availability/detritus, incidence/ambience, and form in space. Dichroic glass filters are mounted at 90˙ to the artwork surface, these filters used to manufacture data projectors cause visible light to be split into distinct beams of different wavelengths in colour. In the absence of images and data information a projector inputs, the ambient light from the space passes through the dichroic filter—splitting and mixing colour across the white canvas surface. This passive yet kinetic mode of painting evolves throughout the day responding to artificial and natural light sources in the space—each installation and moment in time produces a unique unrepeatable coloured image. In this way they contain, in Manning’s words, ‘the proposition of an image’. From 2019-onwards, Manning has incorporated larger sections of filtered glass into wall hung canvases and in exterior architectural installations.