The concept of making multiples (single works made in many separate sections to be assembled OR scattered on the walls) came into being as a practical solution to the difficulties of getting space enough to work on large scale works. Philosophically the concept was always programmed into the system as finished works, whatever their dimensions, stepped out of the system and became smaller units in the larger jigsaw of the installation. They became marks on the greater canvas that was the walls and spaces where they were to be arranged.

Working on small scale "pieces" brought with it the added bonus of an increased scope for "human accidents" directly proportional to the number of pieces.

Next, thanks to my habit of wandering through pound shops, hardware shops and builders merchants subliminally hunting for materials, surfaces etc for building installation elements, I happened upon "ready-made" canvasses (in this instance they were 12cm x 12cm) and immediately thought they would be perfect for making large works on many small units.

Having just received a grant that enabled me to make painting and buy materials, I immediately ordered 200 of these blanks and after unpacking them it became very quickly clear that they had definite potential, in their own right, as minimal units in larger works, to be sometimes painted and sometimes not, as well as the mix of both options! THese thoughts were conjoined in my head with a symbolic and even symbolically actual view of chaos theory and the "manner" of nature's operation (everything, everywhere is built of tiny building blocks that are so similar as to be, practically speaking, identical, one of the key tenets of chaos theory is self similarity over scale, in other words, they might look identical, but the more they are magnified, the more is it possible to see the dissimilarities!!)

("the function of art is to imitate nature in her manner of operation" was a thought articulated by Ananda Coomeraswamy, an Indian art critic, wherein the key element was "in her manner of operation". This had long been, along with the basic tenets of chaos theory and a fascination for the abstract concepts of physics, crucial to the development of my method AND my thinking for many years _ with thanks, I must add, to John Cage _ whose book "Silence" was the trigger that freed my mind and my imagination to wander beyond the boundaries of painting for ideas that could be incorporated into systems for making painting)

For further information please refer to my essay "multiples_thoughts about quantum theory"