Chris Thomas's paintings are as close as you can come on an easel to the texture of the rugged Cornish landscape. Although the artist has worked in North Cornwall for 40 years, he was only recently discovered' by Brian. Following the success of his first one-man show in Burford, he has returned with his recent paintings. He responds to changing light and weather patterns like a latter-day Turner, except his landscapes are pasted thickly with oil on board. The heavy unframed images are not ethereal like Turner's but have intense physicality.
Chris has spent most of the last year in a mobile studio, a Transit van and a lot of that time has been spent on Bodmin Moor, Jamaica Inn and derelict tin-mining country. He says this year has been exceptional. "The weather has provided a phenomenal changing light over the moor and I have tried to catch something of the variety and of the amazing space it illuminates. The wild horses animate the moor and cross my paintings in family groups. Only occasionally have I managed to make any marks which do justice to their presence."
You can see for yourself if his modesty is justified by visiting Burford. His skies are like huge rough seas. In Roughtor and Brown Willy from Davidstow Moor II (pictured), the sky occupies almost two thirds of the board. The artist and critic William Feaver says: "Whether worked with the brush or swiped and spread with a palette knife, the paint vents sensation."
You feel that this artist has an appetite for his county that is insatiable. I understand that. Once I cross the Tamar and leave the A38, I feel I am in another country. Some traces of ancient memory are in the light, the air and the spirit of the place. Chris Thomas is in tune with the moods and visions at the heart of Cornwall.
Recent Paintings can be seen until November 24, at The Brian Sinfield Gallery, 150 High St, Burford (www.briansinfield.com).
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