Drawing's become an important part of Bridge's creative process, after years of petulantly refusing to pick up a pencil. It was in 2012 when he decided to pick one up again so he could sketch some of the ideas burning within. It's still a challenge, but it's allowing his creativity  to develop, setting him free to explore. With his art evolving through this process there's a greater awareness of the challenges which he faces as an artist on a daily basis. The search for understanding through art exposing how, as an artist you can’t take anything for granted in life’s disparate journey. The sponaneity of drawing demonstrating how each day is different to the last and how much we change, even from hour to hour. Exposing actuality and certainty as a moveable feast of possibility, in a life which is neither linear or fixed.

 

Through the spontaneity of drawing he's become aware of the moment, allowing his art to break free from the more rigid approach (influenced by thirty years of making sculpture). Understanding art beyond vanity and ego and how being judgmental towards art distracts from its message. He now realises art can be good, bad, profound, shallow, ugly and beautiful at the same time, depending on subjective interpretation. This realisation and understanding of artistic freedom delivered a bombshell to Bridge's creative equilibrium, and led him to redefine art from a new perspective. He now believes art is anything and everything, a freedom of exploration even if it challenges the principles and traditions of society.  So now when he takes a pencil for a stroll across a piece of paper he knows it's free to roam where ever.

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

 

 

Following his reaquaintance with the pencil Eoghan felt the tightness in his arm and mind as he tried to express himself through drawing. An issue he addressed by drawing each day until he felt the freedom to express himself without reservation. This discipline drew his attention to levels of self-deception which he'd aquired through career choices he'd made as an artist. An awareness which made it possible for him to take the risk once again and break free with his art. The drawings, many of which have been re-created as prints, symbolise his attempt at making art as a free expression. Art free from prescriptive expectations and outside influences, concentrating on the impulse of expression. Achieving a little bit of the "all I want is to be me" and the "all I want is to be free".

 

Bridge's experiencing greater levels of freedom now, though his life is very much a work in progress and he's aware there's a long way to go. But for now he's enjoying the random act of expression through his own visual language. Open to the constant changing of circumstance where no singular goal or achievement can satiate the need to just keep on keeping on. Bridge’s drawings, an expression from a journey of curiosity, searching for answers to age-old questions about the philosophical dilemma we all face.