Spring Time!

by Imogen Bone

Spring has sprung, the sun is shining and the clocks have sprung forward.  The children are released from school  and the leaves are coming out.  It is a hopeful and bright time of year and our Spring mixed exhibition this year has a theme of "Colour and Shape"
It is full to bursting with wonderful colours, here is a stunning painting by Imogen Bone, literally colour and shape, I love it, so bright and glorious orange against the blue.  Simon Stooks has been taking things literally as well, colours and shapes burst forth from his paintings with Stooksien vitality within the mark making.  Richard Thorn has painted some beautiful, truly beautiful, tree shapes with the essence of spring colour mixed into the sky. He has also poured colour onto a canvas and magicked up a "Mystic Pool" which positively glows with light.

by Richard Thorn

Emma Dunbar is characteristically floral, exuberant bunches of spring flowers blooming out of lovely jugs and mugs and patterning the Dunbar world.  It opens tomorrow and at any moment now the whole collection should be on line.  It is a happy show and well worth visiting, don't worry about petrol or the price of pasties, visit the gallery and let your heart fill up with spring hopefulness.

Precious Things

Polzeath Bathers

Did you know that there is a physical reaction when you look at art that you like.  It feels a bit like butterflies, or that feeling when you almost trip downstairs, not totally pleasant, its a rush of adrenalin,  Apparently, according to the science programme on Radio 4 yesterday, it is measurable!  Your pulse quickens and your palms sweat!
Expect a lot of sweaty palms tonight, these paintings are exciting and masterful.  There is a breathless ease with which Andrew Tozer manages to choose such sublime colours, those blues in a sparkling sea, one can imagine that they come out of the tube complete with the cry of gulls and the shouts of children playing.

Summer, Polzeth

The same thing happens with "Summer Polzeth" Effortless brushstrokes become dozens of figures, a sweep of colour is easily a windbreak.  It looks so easy and is actually so difficult.  What hours of work allow someone to catch a shadow, to convey a fleeting moment with such unerring confidence?

Durgan Light, July.

The colours in this body of work are surprisingly bright, like the acid green in Durgan Light, or the joyful grass in Birthday Party,

Birthday Party

but they sit beautifully within the context of each painting.  It is like a glorious summer day, playing on the beach then home for bedtime.   Because after all the excitement of the sea, boats in the bay, clouds scudding across a blue evening sky, a shiny birthday party, we are taken home, where the breeze softly blows the curtains and a little girl plays with precious things

Precious Things

and later, just before bedtime, there is a little time for drawing.

Drawings for Freddie.

This is a wonderful exhibition by an artist who paints with his heart on his pallet.
Opening tonight 16th March and continuing until 28th March.