Throughout my career I have always tried to produce objects or images that explore the relationship between the 'found' and the 'created', that attempt, in some way, to find a point of balance somewhere between these notions and yet remain fundamentally ambiguous. Other polarities or dualities can provide additional axes upon which the work may be placed, although I attempt to avoid overt or didactic messages in my work, preferring the viewer to draw their own conclusions.

I would like to be able to say something about 'presence' in this statement but find that the words to do so elude me. I suspect that this may have as much to do with the limitations of language as with my own frailties. A better understanding of this inarticulable quality, albeit perhaps at a pre-verbal level, is one of my most important artistic goals.

Michael Bowdidge, September 2004