Painting About Light in Cyprus and the UK: An Artist's Thoughts.

'Fiona's Final Visit to Burrswood,' acrylic on canvas, 92 x 72 cm

I'm posting a few new pieces of work.

The above painting was inspired by my final visit to Burrswood on December 2nd. As I have mentioned in previous posts, this was one of my favourite places when I used to paint in situ, and I painted at this place over a 9 year period in all weathers. Now I tend to abstract from the experiences of seeing the light change, walking along many paths around lakes with distant vistas visible through the trees. Always at the end of my painting session I'd walk back out through the forest as the light faded.

During my last visit I left at dusk. There was a warm, colourful light behind the trees to the west and the plaintive sound of the birds followed me out through the forest. This painting is still being considered but my idea was to present myself in nature - naked, authentic to the spiritual experience - as the light faded. There's a suggestion of a chessboard on the distant hills because the random event of the closure of a place that had been open to the public for 70 years was very unexpected and seemed to echo the sometimes random events in people's lives.  I wanted to convey light and to evoke a place but there are parts of the painting I'd like to work on further.

'Cyprus Dusk,' acrylic on canvas, 22 x 30 cm

This is another from my Cyprus Evening series. They are really about an exploration of colour as a parallel for light. I've witnessed the fading evening light in Cyprus over 36 years. It's usually fleeting but there's a moment when objects - houses, Carob trees, paths - melt in to an all pervading colourful light, which saturates the land, with orange, yellow and pink, and this sense of time and light was my main focus.

'Spring Energies,' acrylic on panel, 25 x 18 cm

Finally, this was what I call a 'spin-off' painting which was made during working between other paintings. Spin-off paintings often emerge from an accumulation of ideas that seem to flow off the brush on to the support, usually when my mind is buzzing with expressive possibilities from previous works. I'd just stopped working on 2 other larger canvases and I looked out of my window to see the sun shining - a rare occurence this winter - and began to think of Spring. There's a time during early Spring when the light brightens and you can feel the energies in the breezes. My aim was to catch a sense of movement and light. 

How Important is Knowing an Artist's Intention When Looking at a Painting? (part 2)

'Lost Paradise: Tears For Burrswood,' acrylic on canvas, 50 x 60 cm

I'm posting 2 new paintings and one work in progress. They have a message behind them which I feel it might be important for viewers to know. I don't believe it will spoil their enjoyment of the paintings, if they had attached a different meaning to them, but as the impetus for the first 2 paintings has a highly personal meaning, it seems to be an integral part of the image.

The first one, above, is about a place I loved and which has now gone in to receivership. I first went to Burrswood when I was 17 as my father had just got a job as Public Relations Officer there. It was at that time being promoted as a faith healing centre and my sister had a miraculous healing from Leukaemia there.  Some years later the place became a place for people to stay, as respite for ill people or just to enjoy the peace of the huge grounds, forests and lakes. There is also a beautiful church and I often used to sit in it feeling the quietness. Often I would go to the cafe which had a view down to the lake and distant hills.

I painted there every week over an 8 year period, seeing the trees grow, seeing the change of the seasons with their minute differences from year to year, breathing in all the scents, and always loving the wild orchids that grew near one of the lakes. 

I found out about a month ago that this place, which has occupied much of my life in one way or another, has now closed. My painting is about remembering paths, seasons, flowers, the lakes, and my deep sorrow. It was about wondering what will happen now? Will it all be destroyed as money dictates that flats should be built on the land? The church also destroyed?

It has been a heavily reworked painting and as I seemed to feel there was so much to say, the best thing is now to start another painting. While working on this, I was also exploring my ongoing ideas about colour, composition, (how much to include, where to include it, what could be left out), and how to make an image that respects paint as well as the initial inspiration. Once I start to paint, I walk a line between the original inspiration and what the paint is pushing me to say.

'Spartans Shields Returning Home in the Rain,' acrylic on canvas, 40 x 50 cm

This second painting, which was painted over an older work, is a bit of a strange one! My inspiration was the thought that people's lives often pass through many struggles with courage that is unseen. I thought of the Spartans and their saying 'Return with your shield or on it,' Their shields were emblems of courage and honour and this is why my abstract landscape - which has elements from my 14 years in Cyprus - includes shields. It was quite an intense painting with all kinds of thoughts going through my head at the time and also I wanted the paint to show the traces of my feelings through the brush marks. It is also about the passage of life, the certainty that you can not go back only forwards.

'Throwing Pebbles in the Lake While the Moon Rises,' acrylic on canvas, 50 x 60 cm

The final painting I am posting is one from my moon series. It grew out of my imaginings of being by a lake, usually with pine trees and distant views of mountains, and having the time to sit and throw pebbles in the rippling water while the moon rises. This is imagery I visualise when I'm falling asleep, it's where I would like to be! I liked the idea of the moon changing through different colours, as it does in Cyprus, and I don't feel that the composition is yet there. 

I don't believe all paintings need to be explained. They should greet the viewer with a certain kind of completeness, but when there is an intense message behind them, it can enhance any interested viewer's appreciation of the work to find out more.

March 19th, First real day of Spring

After 4 months of not being able to paint in situ, I was finally able to go out on Saturday. It was the first clear blue sky, the first truly warm air of the year. As I walked up the long drive into the grounds at Burrswood, I could hardly wait to open my watercolour book. The bright sunlight etched skeletal branches with gold, and deep shadows flooded the emerald grass. I usually paint outdoors in January and February, as I like to experience the minute changes to the colours as the seasons progress, but this winter has been too cold, wet, or snow-bound.

Painting outdoors is important to me because through this experience I can re-evaluate elements that are relevant to my studio-based (and more imaginative-based) paintings. I love painting in front of nature, I also love re-assembling the experiences on canvas away from nature. Everything feeds into everything else. Something seen months earlier suddenly pops up as a shape or colour on my canvas.

('March 19th,' watercolour, 16ins x 12ins, painted in situ/ 'The Best May Blossom Ever,' Acrylic on board, 61cm x 91cm, studio painting)

This is a small oil painting I have just finished and which I am entering for the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. It is called 'Waiting.' The idea came from a visit to the cafe at Burrswood one Saturday when I went there to paint. I usually paint in watercolour for 3 or 4 hours then go to have a coffee. On this particular day I noticed a group of teapots huddled on a trolley in the kitchen behind the counter. I felt that they were like a group of women in conversation, and liked the way that the spouts seemed to add to the sense of animation.

I took a photo and this painting was developed from it. Since then I have taken more photos as the grouping keeps changing as teapots are taken out to waiting customers. I will paint some of these other groupings into much larger oil paintings. (This one is only 30cm by 40cm.)

As for the Royal Academy Summer Show, I'm realistic enough to know that it's a lottery! (All of these open exhibitions are a lottery, but this one more than most as usually around 12,000 works are entered, and I believe that wall space for newcomers is at a minimum!)I have submitted work 8 times so far, but perhaps this will be a luckier year?