JAMES HUTCHINSON

Since graduating from St Martin’s as recently as 2004 James Hutchinson has already had two sell-out shows at an enlightened hairdresser’s in Marylebone, London. His work has developed rapidly since moving to Woodbridge in Suffolk and immersing himself in the landscape where, as a country boy from Dorset, he has found inspiration stronger and more natural to him than in urban London.

Inspired by Cézanne, he is aiming in his paintings and drawings to achieve a balance between looking and observation. In his oil paintings he is using colour more expressively and in his drawings working to observe more profoundly. The drawing is an end in itself but of course feeds back into the painting. He feels Picasso looking over his shoulder to check he is working hard enough and to see if he is moving on from Cézanne’s influence. But for the moment he is content to indulge his romantic idea of the artist painting and drawing outside in the landscape: enjoying it, not fighting, not trying to prove anything or improve on nature.

His interest is in the changing seasons, the colours and the sensation of being outside. Most of his time has been spent in woods looking through trees to the sky. Looking through branches makes a fragmented view and he has learnt (from Mondrian) that there is a choice to paint those fragments different colours. There will also be a few earlier experimental works (small acrylics with no drawn lines, monoprints made with charcoal, scribed and inked wood) which will show the evolution to his current preoccupations and output.

North House Gallery has this year embarked on a series of landscape exhibitions starting with acknowledged master etcher Norman Ackroyd (ends 17 March). Because it is rare nowadays to find such a young and serious artist as James Hutchinson in this tradition it is a pleasure to present his first major solo show and we hope that people will feel equal pleasure at coming to support him at the start of his career.

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