A Brush with the East


Richard McGowan


8 September – 30 October 2011


 


A beautiful Chinese landscape drawing from the 14th century is the inspiration for a startlingly different exhibition of contemporary abstract paintings at the Barber Institute of Fine Arts.


 


A Brush with the East features 13 paintings created by Moseley-based artist Richard McGowan in response to Sheng Mou’s Mountainous Landscape of around 1330-62, one of the University of Birmingham-based gallery’s relatively few non-western works of art.


 


McGowan was first impressed by Sheng’s landscape – a large but understated pen drawing on silk – three years ago. Drawn to its economy of line and its subtle use of a limited colour palette, McGowan has sought to recreate these harmonies in his own work using acrylic on canvas.


 


Throughout his career McGowan has painted in an abstract style and has been fascinated with Far Eastern art and poetry. The affinity between Sheng Mou’s beautiful work and McGowan’s abstract paintings reaches beyond the obvious associations with the natural forms found in the landscape. Similarities can be discerned in the lightness of touch, the empty spaces between darker areas of brushwork, which allow the painterly motifs to breathe, and the way in which these works reveal the process of their own making. McGowan’s paintings could also be enlarged studies of sections of the individual brush marks in Mountainous Landscape, which on closer inspection share their vigour and abstraction.


 


Richard McGowan said: ‘The paintings in the exhibition were made over the past couple of years and reflect my long term interest in Oriental art, including painting, prints and ceramics.


 


‘The Barber’s beautiful Chinese landscape provided a perfect focus in order to


compare a work from many centuries ago to contemporary paintings. Whilst


there are compositional similarities such as soft washes of low-key colour and concentrated graphic areas, I also hope to show that contemporary works are part of ongoing history and are not made in isolation’.


 


Richard McGowan was born in Yorkshire in 1950, and has lived and worked in Birmingham since the 1970s. He has exhibited throughout the UK as well as abroad and has work in both private and public collections.


 


Curator of the exhibition, the Barber Learning and Access Officer Tess Radcliffe said: ‘Cutting edge, contemporary art might seem very different to some of the paintings we have on display by the great masters of the past. However, many contemporary artists still find relevance and meaning in these works; Richard McGowan’s wonderful exhibition is a perfect example. We see how Richard’s response to Mountainous Landscape, which is at least 700 hundreds years old, shows both his own work, and Sheng Mou’s, in a refreshing, new light.’


 


‘We are committed to exhibiting the work of contemporary artists at the Barber, many of whom visit the gallery for ideas and artistic inspiration, to highlight the wealth of creative talent in Birmingham.’


 


Richard McGowan will be giving an introduction to A Brush with the East on Thursday 15 September at 1.15pm as part of the Barber’s regular series of free Lunchtime Gallery Talks.


 


A Brush with the East will also be the focus of the Barber’s Chinese Moon Festival celebrations on Tuesday 13 September, 6 – 9pm. The night will feature ribbon dancing, traditional Chinese music, rice and plum wine, delicious moon cakes and twilight tours of the galleries in both English and Mandarin. Everyone is welcome and entry is free. More information can be found on the Barber website at www.barber.org.uk/brushwiththeeast.html


 


Admission to A Brush with the East and our permanent collection is FREE.

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