exhibition - colin fraser

THREADS Colin Fraser







We would like to invite you to the preview party

of

a new collection of work

by

Colin Fraser

Wednesday 17th November 20106.30 to 8.30pm

RSVP

all works are for sale full colour catalogue available

Left. Genuflection (detail). Egg Tempera, 32 5 41 inchesFront cover. Arome (detail). Egg Tempera, 33 5 48 inches

9 Cork Street, Mayfair, London W1S 3LLTel. 020 7494 2021 Fax. 020 7691 9755

Roy m. 077 7164 8512 Jason m. 079 7478 [email protected] www.petleys.co.uk

THREADS

‘Do you have a title for your exhibition this time Colin?’ Roy asked me recently. ‘Yes, Threads’ I replied, unsure quite where this word had come from, let alone what it actually meant. ‘Sounds interesting’ he said.

I suppose ‘threads’ is in part a reference to the physical process of making a painting in egg-tempera, which is a bit like sowing or weaving together a complex tapestry. Only gradual changes can be made however boldly you work. The work is built up in many layers and due to the fast drying nature of the paint is often hatched, dabbed and stroked together. The brushstrokes themselves are very gestural, necessarily reflecting, form, volume, movement, rhythm and speed. They attempt to portray the way something feels both didactically and emotionally. Appearance is secondary to the feel of the thing. You have to put everything into this, allowing your emotion to steer you without letting it tip over into meaningless chaos. Each painting has to become its own unified force.

No matter how hard you try, these issues are ultimately steered by the heart, not the intellect. Making a painting is not an intellectual process. It’s about getting involved and excited about what you are going to paint. Being passionate.

In truth you can’t control egg-tempera, since the process is so complex, so I no longer try. I want the anticipation and excitement I feel about the work I’m doing to come across. Every painting is conceived and started with this excitement as the driving force.

I have been working thematically for a number of years, where each new work is part of on an ongoing process. Certain places, objects or themes become `significant’ to me in some way when portrayed in a painting. The subject matter is the front door into a process that is meditative. You start work and become unaware of any clever ideas or plans that you may have had. It’s just you and the painting.

I make an early start in my studio most days and love the challenges entailed in each new work. Tempera is labour-intensive but the rewards of working in this amazing material make it worth it. And there is the knowledge that the collective threads of the body of work behind you is present and alive, leaving its mark on each thing that you do.

Colin Fraser October 2010

2. Still Running.Egg Tempera, 48 5 31 inches

‘. . . he said briskly: ‘You have to make sacrifices to get competent.

You have to be come like a child to learn a new language and

culture properly. Its humiliating but worthwhile, that isn’t exactly

the way he describes painting as well, but its not far off.’

Previous page1. Dawn Flight.

Egg Tempera, 48 5 48 inches

3. Golden.Egg Tempera, 39 5 44 inches

4. Purple Sash.Egg Tempera, 35 5 24 inches

5. Arome.Egg Tempera, 33 5 48 inches

‘I started working in tempera in around 1981 or 1982 I was in Sweden.

I was looking for something different. Living in an apartment, oil is messy,

you have to use an easel, and it stinks. There is a famous Andrew Wyeth

painting Christina’s world [1948], and I remember having it on my bedroom

wall as a kid, without knowing who it was by. The boy artist hadn’t known

that Wyeth’s compelling work was in tempera.’

10. XX.Tempera, 0 5 0 inches

6. Blue Hills.Egg Tempera, 25 5 32 inches

‘I am inclined to think that there is a strong spiritual point to Fraser’s work.

The one chair in a landscape is a typical motif, Fraser says if you ask

why the chair’s there, he’s failed.’

7. High Light.Egg Tempera, 31 5 48 inches

8. Blue Hills, Egg tempera, 25 x 32.25 inches

9. Glazed. Egg Tempera, 25 5 25 inches

10. Lighthouse.Egg Tempera, 19 5 34 inches

‘. . . so Fraser’s paintings are a curious blend

of the understanding and the brilliant.’

11. Near and Far.Egg Tempera, 45 5 32 inches

12. Oasis.Egg Tempera, 46 5 63 inches

13. Clocks.Egg Tempera, 48 5 32 inches

14. Aura.Egg Tempera, 48 5 32 inches

‘. . . egg yolk is amazing stuff, it can cover amazingly, and you can

use any colour including white. But it is all so translucent.’

15. Fanfair.Egg Tempera, 22 5 32 inches

16. Genuflection.Egg Tempera, 31 5 41 inches

17. Stripes.Egg Tempera, 48 5 33 inches

18. Harbour.Egg Tempera, 47 5 28 inches

19. Inner Light.Egg Tempera, 45 5 63 inches

‘How delicate the shadows on the wall; how rich the flood

of sunlight through the room. And light and shadow,

form and colour are the great, essential, eternal subjects

of the painter, which together, and set upon the human

figure, contrive to make it the most difficult and yet the

most fascinating subject of them all.’

20. Benchmark.Egg Tempera, 24 5 27 inches

21. Threads.Egg Tempera, 22 5 30 inches

22. Vinyard.Egg Tempera, 46 5 71 inches

BIOGRAPHY

Colin Fraser was born in Glasgow in 1956, one of those rare painters who combines exquisite craftsmanship with artistic flair. His chosen medium is egg tempera, probably the oldest painting medium in the world. ‘Tempera has’, he says, ‘a vitality about it which reminds me of the dynamism of the sun – never static, always changing’.

Although a Scot, he studied fine art in Brighton and now lives and works in Sweden where the translucent Scandinavian light falling on objects, flooding through windows and casting deep shadows, helps to give his work its extraordinary quality.

Fraser has always been a master of light and shade be it in the context of the still life, interior or the figure. In his recent body of work, he has added an extra dimension by including reflections. To achieve this he has placed his objects on a sheet of glass. The tonal differences of the reflected image and shadows produce a new interest and depth, both physically and in terms of meaning. Reflecting too, on his past paintings and looking forward to his new work is an important element in any serious artist’s mind.

Above all it is the changing moods of the sun that is the central theme in his work. ‘What I am concerned with’, he writes, ‘is a world that is ongoing, not one frozen as in a snapshot. It’s the feel of the thing, the mood if you like, that the presence of sunlight gives, which fascinates me. You can never pin down in words what the specific ‘mood’ is’.

Colin Fraser exhibits regularly at the Royal Academy Summer show, and at galleries in London, New York and Glasgow. He currently lives in Sweden with his wife and two children.

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

1979 Gallery 20, Brighton, England

1991–3 Gallery Odelhorn, Lund, Sweden

1992 Gallery Löfgren, Gothenburg, Sweden

1993 Fredlund Gallery, Arild, Sweden

1994 Catto Gallery, London, England


1996 Gatehouse Gallery, Glasgow, Scotland


Elinor Ettinger, New York



Molesworth Gallery, Dublin, Ireland


Flying Colours Gallery (Art London)



Mira Godard Gallery, Toronto, Canada

2004 Petley Fine Art, London, England

Gatehouse Gallery, Glasgow, Scotland


Gatehouse Gallery, Glasgow, Scotland

2008 Mira Godard Gallery, Toronto, Canada


Quotes from Colin Fraser’s book Inner Light by Richard D North.

This catalogue and works illustrated in it are protected by copyright and other rights. No part of this catalogue may be adapted or reproduced by any means for any purpose without the written consent of Petleys Limited.

None of the illustrated works may be reproduced, photographed or otherwise copied or adapted without the written consent of the artist.

A Petleys Limited publication.

Printed by Willow Print Services Ltd, Tel 01322 553 333.

9 Cork Street, Mayfair, London W1S 3LLTel. 020 7494 2021 Fax. 020 7691 9755

Roy m. 077 7164 8512 Jason m. 079 7478 [email protected] www.petleys.co.uk

exhibition - colin fraser

Documents

egg tempera

time colin

new work

control eggtempera

body of work

work im

physical process

ongoing process