Stephen Brameld & Jay Staples are WA-based self-taught artists practising in painting, sculpture and video, who simultaneously work on the same artwork until they reach a point of mutual recognition.

In a process akin to surrealistic automatic painting, the artists suppress conscious control of the art-making process and access material from their unconscious and shared processes. The artists describe their collaboration as forming a third mind or space, generating a new perspective (or ghostly presence) that sits outside of artists intention or ego.

The marks the artists make are indistinguishable from each other as they work through a shared visual language forged through their collaboration. The artists will work together on a surface until they reach the mutual understanding that the painting is finished. The paintings of Legal Ghost are presented across two gallery spaces, and are designed as an immersive installation, perceived holistically, all parts together.

Stephen and Jay paint outdoors, board on the ground, and the natural world seeps into their paintings and process – bugs and leaves are captured in the paint and surface of the works. The works have a patina created through exposure, the addition and retraction of paint, and ultimately reflect and record a process of dialogue and mutuality. Legal Ghost is the culmination of close to a decade of collaboration.