MARK GODWIN

"These paintings are from my continuing exploration of the theme of 'landscape'. They are paintings of the imagination, and paintings about feelings. There’s a nostalgic and timelessness about these works. They are paintings about the poetic idea of landscape, and our collective memory of landscape. I am influenced by the 18th Century Romantic notion of the Sublime, and our longing for an emotional encounter before nature. Most of my current work is inspired by the coastline in and around my home county of East Sussex.

I try not to be too specific about locations, the seasons, or the time of day, I am a studio-based artist, whose work is a poetic response to the memory of the landscape, and I do not consider myself as a painter of topographical views. At first glance my paintings may appear 'loose and gestural' and although I am open to chance and the occasional 'happy accident' my paintings are considered and carefully built up with successive overlays of painting.

These paintings mark the borderline between representation and abstraction, between the two realities of paint. Firstly it’s physical materiality, and then its illusionistic quality." — Mark Godwin