Kit Glaisyer
St Michael's Studios, 2009
Media Profile PDF
about the artist
The most recent series of works by artist Kit Glaisyer include a number of ambitious panoramic paintings of the west Dorset countryside that exhibit a profound sense of communion with nature and explore the artist's visionary engagement with a metaphysical and emotional experience of landscape.
Painting with oil on canvas & linen, Kit works for 6 to 12 months on each piece, using multiple glazes and a highly refined technique to create powerful evocations of light, space and mood. The paintings inspire a visceral sensation of our integral (though often forgotten) place within the landscape, strongly influenced by the artist's memories of growing up in Dorset - and his subsequent return.
Deliverately avoiding an overtly conceptual or theoretical approach, Kit's paintings never-the-less include subtle references to cinema, literature and music. They also reinvigorate a tradition that goes back to the Dutch 17th Century landscape painters and to the Romantic works of Casper David Friedrich, William Turner, John Constable and the American Hudson River School.
background
Kit grew up in north Dorset, and studied at Bournemouth and Farnham Art Colleges before moving to London in the early 90's. Starting out as a figurative painter in an 'artists house' in Finsbury Park, North London, working alongside artists Stuart Free and Justin Hibbs, he then moved to nearby Muswell Hill, where he radically changed his approach to painting, and had soon earned a reputation as an accomplished abstract painter.
Kit then moved into the Blue Chapel studios in Camberwell, and a couple of years later helped start Long Lane Studios in Borough, South London, with artist Rufus Knightwebb. During that time he regularly exhibited at the Suzanne Ruggles Gallery on the Kings Road, Chelsea, as well as the New Grafton Gallery in Barnes and the Amberden Gallery, Hampstead.
Then in 1998, while on holiday in Dorset, he was offered - and accepted - a studio at the Oakhayes Art Community in Symondsbury, a small village outside Bridport in West Dorset. Dozens of remarkable artists had been drawn to this quiet hamlet over the years, and Kit's colleagues included artists Douglas McDougall, Dan Bendel and James Ursell. A year later the art community closed, so Kit moved into a disused factory in an old rope-making district of Bridport, and started the St Michael's Studio complex.
Tending to work on series of painitngs that develop over several years, Kit returned to figurative and landscape painting after leaving the city, creating his innovative Drip Figures paintings with the knowledge gained from several years of abstract painting. He also started his popular series of Cafe Royal paintings, based on a 50's bus station cafe close to his studio, and most recently has dedicated himself to an epic series of paintings of the West Dorset landscape..
portrait of the artist
Kit is one of the key artists at the forefront of the vibrant Bridport art scene, and the town now has a growing national reputation as as an important centre for independent-minded artists. In April 2010 Kit published a book "Portrait of the Artist - 25 Bridport Painters & Sculptors" in collaboration with local photographer George Wright and writer Lu Orza, that begins to shed some light on this remarkable West Country town.
In recent years, commissioned paintings have driven the development of Kit's work, and he has deliberately encouraged the traditional role of the buyer as a 'patron' to the artist - so they can make an investment in his art and also help to facilite the artist's progress, allowing Kit to focus exclusivly on achieving his most idealistic and audacious works.
If you are interested in commissioning a painting, please call/email the artist and arrange a studio visit.