Art / Artist of the Month
Artist of the Month: Gail Mason
This month’s featured local artist is Gail Mason, whose limited edition prints of Breathe 1 and Breathe 2 are available through our online shop.
Gail Mason is a painter who seeks to create work that connects observers to the experience of being in a place, both emotionally and physically. She has been based at Spike Print Studio since 2004.
“I create paintings that do not seek to be topographically accurate or describe anywhere in particular, but are amalgamations of real and imagined rural landscapes. They explore how it might feel to be in that environment,” Gail says.
is needed now More than ever
“Colour is very important to me as it primes the emotional nature of an image. I work somewhere between chaos and order. Using colour helps me to recognise and channel some of my emotional world and energy into my paintings.”
Gail has always painted and worked with colour: throughout the 1980s, before moving to Bristol to embark on a Master’s degree in multi-disciplinary printmaking at UWE in the early 2000s, she had a stall at Camden Market designing and hand-painting women’s fashion. “I feel that Bristol has a similar energy to Camden at that time – a real sense of individuality and creativity. The arts scene here is so vibrant,” Gail says. “I particularly love working from Spike Print Studio. It’s an amazing place full of dynamic artists and can-do attitude.”
The works Gail is selling through Bristol24/7 are part of a series of large monotypes, completed for a solo show called Breatheat The Bishop’s Palace in Wells. “These unique works are made by painting directly on a mesh. I have to work fast and trust my instinct, responding immediately to the gestures my brush is making,” Gail says.
“Further editing is performed through subsequent overlays when the work is dry and I have a chance to reflect. I can glimpse the previous layer of paint beneath, but fine detail is invisible so I have to believe that the marks I am making will enhance the painting. I love this semi-blind,high-risk way of making images. It prevents me from becoming too dictatorial, and encourages exploration and experimentation.”
Gail works from Spike Island Print Studio
Gail will be opening her studio to the public during the Spike May Open from May 4-6. You can also catch her at Exhibition #65 in Nailsea from May 9-20 and at the Lam Rim Buddhist Centre in Bedminster as part of the Southbank Bristol Arts Trail (May 12-13).
Profits from artwork sold through Bristol24/7 will be donated to Borderlands, a charity working with refugees and asylum seekers in Bristol. See more of Gail’s work at www.gailmason.co.uk.
See all the work available from Gail and our previous featured artists at b247.staging.proword.press/shop.
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