Large image:

Caption:

Ma Vlast I
gouache
20 x 30 cm
1971



Ma Vlast II
gouache
20 x 30 cm 
1971

Ma Vlast III
gouache
20 x 30 cm 
1972

Ma Vlast IV
gouache
20 x 30 cm 
1972

The title Ma Vlast (My Homeland) is of course borrowed from Smetana, whose lyrical evocations of the river Vltava and the landscape it travels through are the touchstone of musical scene-painting; here it refers to more humdrum surroundings mainly in South London, for which I feel a parallel affection. This was my first attempt at pictorial autobiography using the well-tried combination of postcard sources and texts deriving from A Human Document.

From Work and Texts (1992),  pp. 52-53.