The 1920 Manifesto of Surrealism defined their aim as being "to resolve the previously contradictory conditions of dream and reality." Daniel Hanequand named one of his signature pieces Ghostly Yours as if signing a letter from the other side. Mahmoud Meraji when asked what his painting consisted of stated that he was “truth seeking.” Both of these affirmations speak of making a connection with an unrealised (not made real or actual) idea and then transferring it into a form that can be realised by another. It is a daunting yet obsessive task to turn the nebulous inner states of mind that escape definition into a piece of art. Impressions and philosophies, are sifted through the developed technique of the artist like a strainer that deposits upon the picture surface an image that connects with the unrealised.

Daniel Hanequand was born in France, spent an artistic sojourn in New York City and then immigrated to Canada. He dedicated his life to creating beings (his “friends”), and environments for his invented beings, that became entire worlds unto themselves. Hanequand had an exemplary flare for depiction and with a love for detail; he developed a way of mark-making that is reminiscent of cellular structures. Organic, yet mechanical; hand wrought yet with a repetitive stroke so that the elements seem machine made – the energy contained within the frames is close to explosive. Fully aware of channelling the changelings who spoke through him, his assuredness lives on in each piece. The messages he was passing over, the visual letters signed “ghostly yours”, are still murmuring, chattering, conversing with the intellect of the physical and corporeal realm.

Mahmoud Meraji was born in Iran and moved to Canada with his wife Amideh and his son Mehrad. Both Mehrad and then his father Mahmoud studied at OCAD (Ontario College of Art and Design). A seasoned artist, Mahmoud had already been a portrait painter as well as a modernist. He has an exceptional hand. Unable to rest in depiction of the physical, Meraji visually grapples with the human condition. His recent works embody poetic, ropey spaces that bring to mind the connections between the body and the mind performed by the brain, he superimposes interlocking visuals systems within the frame. Twisting and turning like cerebral folds, as convoluted and irregular as life’s pathways, the figure exists in symbiotic relationship with an abstract context.

Both Daniel Hanequand and Mahmoud Meraji have been composing visual letters, communicating with another dimension that is occupied by spirits, dreams, imaginings, ideas. They have been sending their missives religiously in an attempt to communicate the ‘great incomprehensibles’ in a form that can dissolve our separateness.