Fresh Paint
Inspiring new artworks, straight off the easel
Paul Newland
In psychology, a flow state occurs in the mind of a person when they are fully immersed in an activity. Intense concentration, a feeling of control, and a lack of selfconsciousness are all characteristics of this state, as your grasp of time slips away. Many artists achieve their best work in a similar frame of mind, as ideas percolate and can be followed on impulse. We tend to think of the flow state as being achieved in a single painting session, yet a similar sense of agency and action occurs over a longer period of time when an artist becomes immersed in their practice.
Paul Newland is one such painter who feels as if he has been operating in this long-term flow state for many years now. His works are the sort that can only be created by an artist operating at the peak of his powers, as they remain both dreamlike and utterly purposeful, suggestive yet openended, light of touch yet heavy with meaning. A painting such as Fishing acts not so much as a description of a view but a coalescing of ideas within a landscape setting.
Fishing was initially inspired by a study, made along the River Ouse near Lewes a few years ago, which kept rising to the top of a pile of drawings in Paul’s studio. “Earlier this year it appeared again, just as I’d been thinking about those views and what was in them, exactly, that stirred me,” he explains. “It isn’t necessarily obvious why you are attracted to a setting. It’s very close to where Virginia Woolf met her end and I wondered if that might be it.”
Fishing was also Paul’s attempt to pay homage to a painting of the same name by the Baroque Italian artist Annibale Carracci: “The mood, if you can call it that, of the River Ouse along this stretch seems to match that of the Carracci painting.” It proved a tricky composition to resolve. “It was difficult to make the boat and figures fit into the landscape,” says Paul. “It was helpful to be able to make use of the low tide, so that they did not have to intrude on the distant view over the fields towards the church tower.”
After being selected for the recent ING Discerning Eye exhibition, Paul is keen to revisit Fishing’s theme on a larger scale. Like the Ouse itself, that creative flow never ceases. www.paul-newland.co.uk
Charlotte Keates
When the work of Charlotte Keates was first shown on the Arusha Gallery stand at the London Art Fair several years ago, it was an instant hit. All 35 paintings were sold and the young Somerset-born artist found herself with a waiting list of potential collectors almost overnight.
She returns to the fair in January as a Threadneedle Prize finalist with successful solo exhibitions in London and
New York under her belt.
It makes sense that the 31-year-old Falmouth graduate’s modish interior paintings have since been featured in stylish magazines such as House & Garden and Harper’s Bazaar, yet such periodicals also provide inspiration for the paintings themselves. Her latest masterpiece, Yellow is Mellow, but Tricky to Pull Off, is filled with depictions of patterned rugs, wooden furniture and natural wall designs that could have been lifted from the pages of those titles.
“In this painting I was looking at using collaged objects from magazines – looking heavily at textures, mark making and colour, and the way colours can sit side by side and on top of each other and how that influences the way that the viewer sees the painting and ‘walks into’ or ‘through’ the illusory space,” she explains of the thinking behind the work. “I was also looking at how drawing in paint can be used to work into and over the top of flat colour, on the yellow walls.”
Her fondness for poetic, often whimsical titles comes from these pages as well. “The title was inspired by flicking through one of the magazines that inspired the painting, finding a phrase in an article that resonates with the work,” she adds. Charlotte likes to create haikus from these found sentences which she mulls over during the act of painting. Yet while her colourful spaces feel fresh and modern, there is also a timeless quality to the architectural styles depicted. The artist worked part-time in an interior design company in London while she was starting her art career and she cites mid-century visionaries such as Frank Lloyd Wright and Buckminster Fuller among her inspirations.
Just prior to the pandemic, Charlotte left her East London studio and moved to Guernsey with her husband. A purposebuilt studio by the sea looks set to be the ideal spot for this fascinating artist’s blossoming career to develop. Charlotte’s work will feature at the Arusha Gallery stand at London Art Fair from 19-23 January. www.arushagallery.com
Paco Martin
When it comes to coloured pencils, one of the biggest misconceptions is that they should be left in the classroom. Yet proving the medium requires a level of expertise on par with other more traditional art forms is Portfolio Plus member Paco Martin.
The Spanish artist and art tutor is also calling for his works to be considered as paintings, rather than drawings. “I’m using coloured pencils, but I’m applying a lot of pigment,” he reasons. The proof is in the numbers, with Paco applying around 30 layers of colour per artwork.
Rather than using solvents or blenders, Paco achieves his luscious, even coverage by blending out colours with a lighter hue of pencil. Before this stage is reached, however, he lays down his initial marks on the paper – always a white sheet, usually from the Spanish range Caballo 109 – with light, gentle strokes, increasing the pressure as he progresses.
Standing out in this recent artwork, Dance of the Leaves, is the contrast between the smooth leaves of the ivy and the rough tree bark behind. “I made many trials with the bark,” Paco explains. “It took me a long time to achieve. I ended up using just a black and a brown [pencils] and an eraser – the eraser helped a lot to get the texture.”
Finessing different textures is probably the biggest challenge for the artist, with a recent still life involving tin foil proving particularly demanding. But what advice does he have to offer his own students? “They’re usually in such a rush, but there’s no hurry,” he says. “You cannot accomplish something good in just a few hours, no matter if we are talking about coloured pencils, oils, pastels or any other technique. It’s a fine art.”
Indeed, looking at Paco’s Portfolio Plus page, it’s clear his work is deserved of such a distinction. www.artistsandillustrators.co.uk/pacomartin