Joe Blundell - 'Habitats'

Wednesday 4 - Sunday 29 September 2019

"Someone asked me a while back why I paint such detail in my landscapes. It’s because I’m not really interested in the ‘big vista’ of a scene. I was the kid who always found money by the roadside – not because I’ve got great eyesight, but because I was always looking down: looking closely at the details around me – the ‘moving parts’ of the world. So it is with nature. I like to see the way light hits an individual leaf or a twig rather than study the rolling hills. When I see nature, I see it as a complex entanglement of shapes, patterns and non-patterns. I do not want to summarise it. I do not see a summary. I want to capture all the elements that make it and resolve their contribution to the scene. I want to capture Nature’s moving parts like a collection of abstract components.

In this series of paintings, I have tried to get into the landscape. To capture its complexity and make sense of it. To understand its beauty. The six works in Habitats are all studio paintings. They are based on photographs, drawings ,time spent on location and a lifetime of looking".