Floral
Douglas Davies RSW
Alison McWhirter BA MA
Gail Murray RSW PAI
Ann Oram RSW
Naoko Shibuya MFA
Ronald F Smith RSW RGI PAI
28 September to 27 October
Preview: Friday 27 September 6-8pm
Our next exhibition has a Floral theme and features six invited artists who are all well known for their work in the genre. As with all our small group shows, each artist exhibits a completely different and recognisable style which results in an interesting and varied exhibition.
Douglas Davies graduated from Edinburgh College of Art in 1970 and lectured in Ceramics at Glasgow School of Art until 1986 when he left to concentrate on his own pottery and painting. Douglas is inspired by the landscape of the Scottish Borders where he lives and produces beautifully expressive, impressionistic landscapes and still lifes.
Alison McWhirter graduated with a BA in painting from Bath Academy of Art where she stayed on to do her MA in Visual Culture in 2000. Alison went on to work in Publishing and teaching before concentrating on her own painting career. Alison’s work is instantly recognisable – her beautiful abstracted floral still lifes are applied in an instinctive, painterly fashion with a bold, vividly coloured palette.
We have recently exhibited Ann Oram’s architectural pieces but here we concentrate on another of her loves, still life, floral painting. Ann graduated from Edinburgh College of Art in 1982 where she studied under some of the great Scottish artists; Robin Philipson, John Houston, Elizabeth Blackadder, Victoria Crowe and David Michie. Working in a variety of mediums, oil, watercolour, acrylic and ink, Ann’s floral pieces, underpinned with beautiful ink drawing, are joyously exuberant, bursting with vitality, a real celebration of colour.
Gail Murray graduated in Printed Textiles from Glasgow School of Art in 1969 and since then has exhibited throughout the UK regularly showing at the Annual Exhibitions at the RGI, RSA, RSW, SSA and PAI. Gail’s paintings are mainly still life or landscape but often an intriguing mixture of both. Using mixed media, print and collage, Gail’s subjects are drawn from personal experiences, memories and treasured objects. Each composition develops as the painting progresses, never starting out with a defined goal in mind.
Ronald F Smith also graduated from Glasgow School of Art in 1969 in Painting and Drawing and has exhibited extensively in group and solos shows across the UK and has won numerous prizes at the Annual RGI, RSW and PAI exhibitions. Influenced by some of his great tutors, Duncan Shanks, James Robertson and David Donaldson, Ronald’s painterly style exudes warmth and colour. Seemingly simple compositions are transformed with his bold yet subtle use of colour. As is often the case, photographs really don’t do them justice.
Naoko Shibuya was born in Tokyo and graduated in 2001 from Edinburgh College of Art with an MFA in Painting & Drawing. Exhibiting across the UK, New York and Tokyo, Naoko’s work is inspired by “fleeting moments from nature” gathering information from regular visits to botanic gardens. The circles and spirals in Naoko’s work represent reincarnation, often found in Zen & Celtic philosophies, and express the perpetual flow of nature in her compositions.
