CRAIG CULLYArtist and Educator

Discourse of the Chase

In a line from his play, A Woman of No Importance, Oscar Wilde described foxhunting as "The unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable". The implications of this statement form the central question of my current research—what are the reasons for our persistent need to chase that which we know has no apparent utility and what does this say about our capacity for empathy despite the apparent futility of such pursuits.

The study of this centuries-old sport has informed my current studio practice in which I have cast foxhunting as the central character in  a series of allegorical paintings portraying the ambivalent, and even at times contentious, relationship between humans and animals as well as the interdependence and alliances that these two species have attempted to forge and in which they appear find value in the pursuit alone—shaping the discourse of the chase.