The subjects of Ranny Macdonald’s paintings are all too familiar inhabitants of daily life: pigeons and dogs encountered whilst walking in urban or rural settings. Yet, there is nothing ordinary about the way we view the cast of creatures in ‘One Small Step’. Immersed in his larger canvases, you find yourself exalted in the sky or planted beneath a totemic paw. Diminutive dogs take on colossal stature, and plump pigeons become orb-like, ornamental in their mass. Macdonald’s unique vantage points recall the perspectival experimentation found in David Hockney’s Moving Focus series, though it is through the world of sentient beings, rather than interior spaces, that we navigate extraordinary points of view.
One of the most endearing motifs within the show is a pomeranian. In one painting, the cloud-like canine is caught mid-step. Its softness is no setback, indicated by the self-determination with which it strides. What of its human counterpart? ‘I’m questioning who is really leading who’, Macdonald says, as we contemplate an anonymous foot, moving away from our line of sight. The artist’s choice to only hint at human presence in One Small Step is a considered one. Disembodied limbs or backward facing silhouettes are visual cues, drawing our attention away from an anthropocentric focus, a thematic concern throughout the artist’s practice. Macdonald uses the picture frame as a broader world-view, playfully and thoughtfully revealing and obscuring parts of an image to question our conceptual frameworks.
Citing the influence of philosopher Donna Haraway’s writing on species, the artist’s works often comically probe the domestication of our four-legged companions. For Haraway, the relationship between us and pets is one of mutual dependency. This dynamic is artistically envisioned in the exhibition’s titular painting, ‘One Small Step’, in which the Pomeranian rivals the height of a skyscraper, its face barely emerging from a plush abyss of fur. Abstracted into geometric contours and wielding an enormous strength, this exaggerated sense of form is for the artist a ‘Pixar perspective, but also a sculptural visual language.’ It becomes clear to me that in MacDonald’s representations, whimsy and force are not mutually exclusive. Childhood nostalgia intermingles with the formal vocabulary of Italian Futurism, recalling sculptures like Umberto Boccioni’s Unique Forms in Space, or paintings such as Giacomo Balla’s Dynamism of a Dog on a Leash. Similarly breaking down motion into its constituent parts, you can’t help but be taken in by the sheer agility of the artist’s anthropomorphic figures. However absurdly, you somehow believe that they might outrun, or outweigh you. This embodied sense allows the eye and mind to wander, dismantling the expected hierarchies between human beings and their fellow species.
Although Macdonald’s practice engages with environmental and existential themes, what draws me in is the intuitive way in which he works. Rooted in diaristic observation, his drawings and paintings are the outcome of walks in London, or the streets in Brescia, Italy, where the artist recently completed a residency. His palette is muted and subtly illuminated —an effect that is as natural as it appears, as the artist uses locally sourced earth pigments and traditional binders. Trusting in his eye and materials, the result is one of understated beauty, reaching its literal and symbolic height in ‘Hope in the Air’, a painting in which we soar alongside a bird in flight, an ethereal scene where cloud, feather and skyscraper converge. The work embodies Macdonald’s elevation of the seemingly mundane: an unimposing, yet assured belief of the magic to be found in our everyday surroundings. In composition and in outlook, the artist continually challenges our point of view, transfiguring the cityscape and its occupants, offering us new ways of seeing. His Granted fresh eyes, but no fixed orientation, it is up to us about where to go next.
Words Curator & Writer Anna Moss
One Small Step ran at General Assembly in November. Rannie’s work is also featured in ‘The Seven Lamps’, at Hypha Studios, Camberwell, curated by Juliet Wilson until 4th Jan.
