Stuart Cooper: Natures Soul- Symbols of a natural space
21sth May to 28th June 2013
Open eve: 28th May 7-9pm
My recent work focuses on presenting familiar natural objects often somewhat larger than life within a landscape setting defined by unusual cloud formations, dark shadows and filtering light. Within the strong contours and compositional forms of land and space laid down with successive layering of paint, I am aiming to express something symbolic and timeless. The very life and soul of nature.
I am becoming more sensitive to the appearance of paint on the surface of the canvas and in areas of the painting I like to build up texture by applying successive layers of paint allowing some of the undertones to break through. I like to work rapidly, almost crudely when I start a new piece, allowing the paint to find its way and have a ‘free hand’. My strategy is quiet simple – subtle relationships of complimentary colours with a random dash of harsher colour; I might suddenly ‘slap on’ a splodge of paint from a heavily laden brush but then slow down and be more contemplative and less erratic.
At the moment I am drawing inspiration from the English landscape and composing scenes or concentrating on subject matter that I feel has some symbolic meaning and language that speaks closely of nature. In order to really express what I feel I often need to apply the paint quite thickly in areas on the canvas although I have not entirely broken away from a strong sense of line and shape.
It is important for me to recognise and be able to connect with obvious elemental forms and shapes within nature – the tree, the hills, the sun and moon, as well as other natural objects which for me hold a more unusual meaning and energy.
At this stage in my progress as an artist and painter I do not wish to totally abandon a representational genre in favour of pure abstraction.