Hidden, Sheds in Ruin

 

Hidden, Sheds in Ruin - oil on canvas - 20"x18"

For purchasing, please contact, info@richardhearns.com

The Outhouse

The Outhouse - oil on canvas - 16"x16"

Available for purchase, for pricing please contact info@richardhearns.com

Mud Cottage, Owenwee Forest

 

Mud Cottage, Owenwee Forest - oil on canvas - 40"x30"

Available for purchase, for pricing please contact, info@richardhearns.com

The Clare Champion, Newspaper

 

A short article with featured in The Clare Champion Newspaper.
Friday, 31st of August 2012.

You can click on image above to enlarge.

Stone Wall, Country Road

 

Stone Wall, Country Road - oil on canvas - 40"x30" - sold

Mapping the emotive, evocative and accidental

 

On occasions I have, over the past few years, written about my work or in connection with my work, but I do feel the artist doesn't really control the meaning of their work. People bring to bear their own experience while viewing or living with an art work.
In saying that, I do believe it is easier to talk about your work and interpret it when there exists a considerable gap of time between you and the work created. And I also believe that the artist does have control over their output, and what they choose put out into the world during their lifetime.

The work I have begun to create here in the Burren this year is concerned with 'place'.
I am painting in series, so as to investigate the idea of place, and what that might mean to me.
One of the reasons for this investigation and exploration of 'place' is quite biographical, as I have lived somewhat of a nomadic artists life over the years and have never 'settled down'. Even with my wife by my side we are still to find a 'permanant place' to 'settle'.
I have spent over four years now working out in the west of Ireland, and before this spent a lot of time in Thailand, travelling light and spending extended periods of time in the one place, usually in quite remote areas. Perhaps a bit of a loner's existence, but it offered me the chance to draw, paint, develop my art and get to explore Ireland and many other countries over extended periods.

In my early expressive figure in landscape pieces, the motif was always this lone being surrounded by the vastness of landscape, or captured somewhat, in a smaller dimensional or architectural space.
Working in rural locations has always spurred bouts of great artistic creativity for me.
With these current paintings I am creating a map, or mapping out my experience. There are many different ways to create a map, and I am in a way, intimately documenting my findings here over time. I do feel it is important for the artist to know his subject intimately.
That is what this series of paintings might convey, my experience, the surrounding nature, a shelter and the absence of people.

Perhaps the shelters, houses, walls, cottages and barns that feature in my current work are an extension of 'the being' in my earlier work? A humans print or thumb mark on the landscape? These empty places, spaces and ruins that interest me are also part of a vanishing history in the Irish landscape, quietly saying, 'I was here'. It's this feeling of a scarcely populated space, with only clues or impressions of the people who may have been there over the years that drives me ahead, searching for meaning.

Looking forward to sharing this work with you over the coming months.

Richard

Cultivating a Sense of Place

Arrived back in the heart of the Burren on Monday last, after a three month search for a suitable studio space in Dublin did not bear fruit! I had envisaged working close to my family home in Malahide since my return from New York, and did, after some time, find a location in Howth which I was really keen on. I had hoped to secure a deal on the place but the landlord wanted to much rent - double what I was willing to pay for the run down house!
Needless to say I was a little distraught, as I had invested a good bit of time and energy into finding a suitable place in Dublin, and had hoped for a positive outcome. But it is amazing how things work out - Now my feeling is that my work will benefit hugely from being out west again. I know I can work well in this place and sense a strong drive building. The house in Howth would have taken up a lot of my time just getting the place ready to work in - but out here I am free, and know I can work here! Already started a new body of work and am going to focus on developing this over the coming months in preparation for my next show in New York in 2013.

The Cottage.

The Studio.

My Neighbour.

Ballyvaughan is the most idyllic village. I love being back here. The peace and quietness of the surrounding landscape coupled with a wonderful community of people makes for a great space to 'cultivate a new sense of place'.

Self Portrait, at the Easel

Self Portrait, at the Easel - oil on canvas - NFS

Detail of brush work from 'Self Portrait at the Easel' below

Full image to follow shortly.

Practicing Silence

Practicing Silence,
Self portrait with Grandmother's mirror and drawing easel - oil/panel - NFS

Self Portrait with Brush and Pictorial Device

Self Portrait with Brush and Pictorial Device - oil on canvas - 24"x18" - NFS

Over the past few weeks I have been interested in returning to the 'self portrait'.

It has been a very inwardly rewarding experience, while at the same time allowing me the freedom to experiment with my growing appreciation for application and gesture.

I have spent time gathering images together of the many self portraits I have created over the years and look forward to share them along with some of the remembered emotions I felt while creating them with you soon.

Self Portraits can convey an emotive power of presence reaching beyond the confines of the canvas. They tell stories of time and timelessness. The methodology inherent in self portraits continues to employ and capture for me, the sublime fleeting moment. My continued method of painting 'from life' frees me from the sobering detachment of mechanical means of recording, and requires me to race and work fast which suits my personality. Hand, Eye, Heart, as David Hockney puts it!

This fluid piece was created in one session, with one brush.

I enjoy in it, the abstractions, paint surface and treatment, which I feel consistently shifts from image to paint, and paint to surface. The brush work is cursive yet powerful - plunging you and me into the realm of immediacy.