A Landscape artist making art, in 2022
9 January 2022
New year: new collections and website to come
Things have been getting a bit stagnant and messy round here (in this bit of internet land).
Time for an update, and a tidy, so it matches what's been going on behind the scenes. Yes, there's been some secret and some not so secret landscape art going on.
This website has been in this corner of the internet since 2005. 17 years – I can hardly believe it.
It's had several redesigns during that time. The last major redesign was five years ago.
My art however, has been going through quite a change in the last few years, unlike my website. So my website and my art have gradually got confused and out of tune with each other. It's time, this year, to put that right.
A lot more art than meets the eye
My linoprints are what this website was first about. It's all there was on it in the beginning.
I'm known for my original prints, and they've been published and accepted to exhibitions for many years. They're not the whole story though.
Before I can design my landscape linocut prints, I need to study the scenery closely, outdoors, first hand. I've never relied on photos. Photos have always played a tiny role in my art, because photos are not actually that useful.
So the truth is that linocut prints have been a small part of the art I've been making all this time.
I've always been a big sketcher, and I've painted outside using watercolour, gouache, acrylic and mixed media since forever.
All these sketches and paintings were the starting point for my linocuts back in my studio. Without them, I'd have never made any prints.
I've not really published much of this preparation artwork though. Not until my trip to a wild fairytale castle on an epic beach, that is.
A plein‑air artist indoors?
('Plein‑air' means 'in the fresh air' outside)
I gradually drifted into spending more and more time in my studio without realising it.
Something quietly got out of balance. My linocuts demanded a lot of time in the studio at the expense of studying the landscape first hand. It didn't do my art any good and I stalled a bit, unsure what was wrong.
I grew up outdoors in the countryside. So it was only a matter of time before nature's child craved wide open spaces in the landscape again.
My wild child escaped in Northumberland
The kid got its way in 2016 in Northumberland. That was the start of things shifting.
I see it now. I didn't at the time. All I knew was a feeling of being where I belonged, and that something was 'right'.
2016 was the first time I'd been able to spend a whole week dedicated completely to painting outside you see. So in a wild and wonderful landscape that is Bamburgh Castle, on the coast of Northumberland, I returned to my artistic roots.
It's been hard to stay in the studio ever since.
I began using oil paint outdoors, 'En Plein‑air', shortly after. And that put a vital piece in place in my quest to be the best artist I can be.
To be continued next month…
