in nine equal parts, shown in a random order (some surface incidents) - it takes a perfectionist to appreciate the small imperfections...these nine 'parts' together comprise one of my series of small paintings called edgescapes. i found, or unearthed, four edgescape panels in a semi-completed state (luckily not consigned to the trash), and this particular painting on panel will be on show at the Harleston Gallery, Norfolk, from 18th June to 11 July 2011, along with some more of my abstract paintings... i am most honoured to be exhibiting as a 'guest artist' in HWAT 2011...
both the wood & the hardboard used to construct this series of paintings on panel was scavenged from a skip. i am quite handy with a mitre saw... i once found some small pieces of wood in the middle of the road, in the street where i live... well, if the trucks wouldn't travel so darn fast...i bought some acrylic paints and they have lasted me years - so i am obviously quite frugal with colour... my favourite colour (absolutely) is grey because there are so many hues...
perhaps there is a trace of puritanism in my aesthetic, eschewing joy or extravagance in my process. i am mindful and serious, the less said the more done . i often work in silence, but true silence is a rare thing, even in the countryside...solitude (i think) makes for better paintings - i call upon rembrandt and goya as some good examples...
i often utilise materials derived from my environment in my paintings - soil from the garden, ash from the fire grate, tiny seeds or powdered eggshells. i carefully prepare and store these materials in jars - i like a semblance of order in my art studio. i like working with texture simply because it engages the senses beyond looking - there are incidental memories embedded in the surface...my paintings evolve from a process of loss & sometimes failure, since i seem to erase most of what i paint - i lose sight of the thing in order to find it again... incidental flaws can be beautiful in their own way...i am sad about some things but hopeful about others... if i can create art when i am doubtful then then there is always the possibility of making something better...
i have never felt confident enough to go completely abstract in my process, in the manner of gerhard richter or robert ryman, although i believe that the paintings i have created are objects in themselves with their own distinct identity & reality, perhaps like human beings who assert their individuality but still desire to 'fit in' somehow with the rest of the world...perhaps i am just asserting their right to be different...
i am not sure that i am really a painter in the conventional sense - i do not make pictures and any resemblance to a known reality is often a coincidence... i take photographs to help me remember, but i fear that if i look at them for too long or work directly from them there will be a kind of pseudo realism creeping in (one can always tell)...i tried this with drawing and they became very scientific...my work is perhaps a type of visual intervention in the course of an implicit understanding or knowledge, a quiet conveyance or translation of experience, between what exists and what most sticks in the mind, connected to the immediate, known environment..
my art seems to be driven by the small reminders of life and death, that nothing remains constant, how things fracture, break down, disappear - i am aware of mortality and the transience of our life on earth...i am happy being older (and hopefully wiser) but it bothers me that i can't see things as sharply as i once did - perhaps this will turn out to be a good thing (for a painter)...
it still rankles with me that i didn't get a painting accepted into a regional art exhibition. in their words they were: looking for recent works by artists who particularly engage with habitat, the environment, and both the natural and the man-made world in their process... perhaps my paintings didn't sufficiently portray this environmental element - such a rejection is always food for thought... sensitivity creates a tough skin over time, an outer crust or patina of self-protection, and it feeds back into the painting process - we want to say less...
i have been thinking more about water and clouds and how they represent flux, fluidity, distance and a certain kind of unobtainable otherness... my world is not static, flat and contained within a square but i seem to have have made it look so... we need air to breathe and we are (i think) about 90% water, so these elements are omnipresent in our being...
...i am reminded by seeing the work of more established artists that i must have at least thirty more years of painting ahead of me to get this thing right (this is many more years than i have been painting so this is a positive thing)....today they announced that parts of east anglia are officially in drought, that wildlife is at risk and that farmers must be more prudent in using water on their crops. today it rained just as i remembered it (and i have been putting water out for the birds)....all images & text © jazz green 2011...last chance to see Six Abstract PaintersHalesworth Gallery, Steeple End, Opp. St Mary’s Church, Halesworth, Suffolk, IP19 8LL28 May to 15 June 2011open daily, Monday-Saturday 11am to 5pm, Sundays 2pm – 5pm...on now: Reunion Refresh @ Reunion Gallery, 5 Feb - 22 Oct 2011next up: HWAT exhibition 2011, Harleston Gallery, 18 June to 11 July 2011...
slow painting
in december 2008 i wrote i had started some incidental abstract paintings on some scavenged pieces of wood, surfaces that have been gradually built-up, partially obscured, then revealed, slowly reworked & edited over the course of about two years. it was never my intention to finish these paintings in a week or a month - painting them has been a slow, drawn-out process, as i added some colour here and there and then left them for quite a while, before attending to them again, effectively lost then found again - a succession of related 'incidents' contributed to the visual outcome of these paintings.here are some surface details of one of the incidental abstract paintings...
as ever, the colours are muted, faded... and the surface textures a little aged...
drawn from hereabouts perhaps, in the rural/industrial environs...
a chalky, bluish white, a greeny-grey and a dark, earthy brown...
elements of stone, dark earth and slate grey-black...
a slab of tawny orange, light grey and a thin brown stripe...
dark brown-black and a scrubby, scratched layer of grey-green......the dilemma of having to give paintings titles, which should either reference the process or the subject matter... square forms, surface elements, hidden layers, interior/exterior, industrial blocks, stacks, containers, structures, doors, windows, walls, a flawed facade..?this painting 'incident' is called 'orange slab, dark brown and various greys', 30cm x 30cm, acrylic on wood...
orange slab, dark brown and various greys, 2011if these incidental paintings represent anything, they are another small record of my enduring fascination with weathered surfaces and the working dialogue that develops as i have created them - the slow emergence of a simple grid structure or rectilinear form, much influenced by the originating ground or surface (wood) - unlike say, the relative smoothness (or 'not') of paper or the regular weave of canvas (i like the texture & colour of raw canvas, but i seem to go to great lengths to deny its material existence in my paintings)...some visual clues scavenged from the journal archive might hint at some of my surface influences...
…all images & text © jazz green 2005-2011…Reunion Refresh @ Reunion Gallery, 5 Feb - 22 Oct 2011(incidentally, there will be two 'incident paintings' on wood in the reunion refresh exhibition)HWAT exhibition 2011 @ Harleston Gallery, 18 June to 11 July 2011...
six abstract painters : a private view
walking past st mary's churchyard from the marketplace towards the new exhibition 'six abstract painters' at the halesworth gallery, this is what you will first see - a most charming grade II listed building, built in 1686 (or perhaps earlier). as with a lot of very old buildings they are altered and rebuilt over the centuries making them difficult to date accurately. this building was formerly the town's almshouses - that is, a place providing shelter for the destitute & impoverished of the parish.
i was surprised to discover that this building still functioned as almshouses up to the early 1960s (read more information on halesworth, its history and the halesworth town trail here). the halesworth gallery has exhibited art by some notable names in twentieth century british art - including sculptor elisabeth frink and the painters mary fedden RA, feliks topolski, josef herman, mary potter and margaret mellis...the selection of artists for inclusion in the halesworth gallery exhibition programme takes place in january following a national 'call for artists'. the exhibitions are planned & organised by a gallery committee. the halesworth gallery is only open from may to september as the building is very old and unheated (it would be very costly to heat it effectively, given the restrictions laid down on modernising listed buildings). so, the halesworth gallery season closes each september with a fabulous 'open' art exhibition, where every artwork submitted (with some size restrictions) is exhibited. i am always amazed how efficiently & imaginatively this process is undertaken, and the exhibition always attracts a lot of visitors. i must actually remember to submit a little something this year!the halesworth gallery is now an established exhibition venue in central suffolk, it is non-profit-making, run by a team of dedicated volunteers, with a commitment to showing high quality, contemporary art (including painting, printmaking & sculpture) by professional artists who have strong connections or links to suffolk or east anglia. ok, let's go in and take a look around the current exhibition, 'six abstract painters'...
this is the first room of the gallery, showing mixed media paintings by the painter mari french, along the leftside wall. on the small table is the gallery's guest book. the view through the window looks across to the church...
over to the other side of the first room are mixed media paintings by norfolk artist anthea eames (with one of her paintings hung in the old fireplace). there are two more of mari french's canvases to the right. these two small works by mari caught my eye, where she has used plaster & textile collage elements to build up surface texture...
mari french, ancient landscapes IV & V, mixed media on plaster on panelmari french's recent series of paintings are inspired by the open landscapes of north norfolk, where she has recently moved to from the highlands of scotland - from one dramatic landscape to another. in mari's own words: "light and atmospherics play a strong part in my finished pieces, where the build-up of complex layers and the exposure of under-painting all add to the visual intensity."these two paintings by anthea eames are near the reception desk...
anthea eames, coastal dwelling & coastal dreaming II, mixed media, including norfolk woad, earth pigments and sandanthea eames' map-like abstract paintings have strongly cultural resonances, bound up in the history of ancient sites or tribal landscapes. anthea says that: "my more recent work draws on my present home in Norfolk and frequent visits to Australia. Collecting impressions and subsequently working with these, I attempt to understand my place in these disparate worlds. Each location brings with it its own spirit, colour and textural palette." also key to anthea's process is that she sources & uses locally-derived pigments and earth minerals in her work, such as norfolk woad... these are the kind of paintings, embedded as they are with discreet layers of history and meaning, which ask to be deciphered slowly...on through to the next room of the gallery, we encounter the work of another norfolk-based artist, john midgley...
john midgley, marsh cut, threshold I & II, oil on canvasi first came across one of john midgley's paintings at salthouse 09, where i was also an exhibitor. he describes his paintings as "strident, gritty paintings that grab you by the collar and demand attention."this new series of landscape-derived works have a more subdued mood though, reminding me of the poetic daubings of cy twombly. you really have to see these paintings close-up to appreciate the gestural brushwork. this series of paintings are inspired by the same location, salthouse marshes. john has been a member of the salthouse art committee since 2008 and is also exhibiting in this year's salthouse art exhibition, salthouse 11: ad limina, curated by art historian and gallery owner of art1821, laura williams...the artist geraldine carratu is exhibiting some large canvases on the opposite wall; she is also based in norfolk. she works in both acrylics and oils. these three paintings worked well together, united in form and content...
geraldine carratu, evening sail, harbour blue & beach hutthis leads us through to the third and final room of the gallery, one that feels lighter and more spacious. to the left are a series of canvases & works on panel by the london-based artist joan hickson. joan works with a muted colour palette and her paintings suggest the weathered elements of the coast...
joan hickson, sleep I, mixed media on canvas, and waterfront study 1 -4, mixed media on boardand lastly, to some of my own paintings in this exhibition…
to the right, in the fireplace, the large canvas painting, edgescape rostand over there, on the church-side wall, three farmscapes…
farmscape VI, VII and II, mixed media on canvasyou can see more abstract farmscape paintings here...
edgescape fennyou can see more pictures of the abstract painting fenn here. the observant might also note a change in orientation - this is because this is (to me) a seasonal painting; in the spring the suggestion of new life rises up from the earth, in the winter it is sleeping below ground...and lastly, to some of my small iCons…
wildwood I, II, III
siena (top), congo and redwood (below)
close-up of one of the small iCons - redwood, 2011you can see more images from this exhibition in the previous post: six abstract painters : an exhibition...Six Abstract Painters, Halesworth Gallery*, Steeple End, Opp. St Mary's Church, Halesworth, Suffolk, IP19 8LL28 May to 15 June 2011open daily, Monday-Saturday 11am to 5pm, Sundays 2pm - 5pm......if you are holidaying on the beautiful suffolk coast, or perhaps visiting aldeburgh, snape, southwold, walberswick or dunwich, the small market town of halesworth is only a short drive away, a few miles further inland from blythburgh church (with the legendary scratches of the fearsome 'black shuck', curious pew carvings representing the seven deadly sins and exquisitely carved angels high up in the roof), and not far from henham park (a private estate which hosts the annual latitude music festival). the town of halesworth is signposted off the a12.*n.b. due to the unique character and age of the building those with mobility issues will find the steep, narrow stairs to the upstairs gallery difficult. please call the gallery on 01986 873064 should you require any assistance or more information prior to your visit......addendum: the artist mari french has put up some photographs of the preview evening of 'six abstract painters' here......