Meet the artist — Graham Leonard King RBSA
'Inspiration comes in many guises. It can be the silhouette of a single tree, the roll of distant hills or the engaging rhythms found within a cloud formation. Any or all can trigger the need to capture a moment, to freeze an image in time.
Landscape is my main interest and provides the subject matter for the majority of my work, though I do stray into other genres occasionally in order to set myself a challenge and refresh my enthusiasm.
My landscapes depict both real and enhanced images of the countryside, the latter being a manipulation of the landscape rather than faithfully reproducing a specific location. I use reference material and images collected from various sources in order to create the desired composition.
Livestock are often introduced as a focal element within the composition, that also imbues the work with a quintessential British quality.
The palette is influenced by my early years living in South Wales, with its slate-grey skies and rain-coloured vistas, hence my use of muted colour, rather than employing the more vivid range contained within the spectrum. The quality of light is always an important and indeed essential element of the piece, adding both interest and definition which in turn enhances the ambience of the finished work.
Larger paintings are produced using acrylics on a wooden panel, primed with white gesso and mounted on timber returns to create a box canvas. This rigid surface provides the foundation for a variety of techniques to be employed, encompassing the lightness of watercolour, to the impasto application of oils. It is this combination of subject matter, atmospherics and surface treatment, that fuels my passion for the visual, and drives my desire to create.
Ultimately, I am encouraged to continue striving for the unattainable by the affirmation that'
