Richard Pearce

Richard Pearce has spent his adult life living and working a few inches from the ocean on the Isles of Scilly, where he was born in 1953. Richard's paintings provide an insight into a way of life totally dominated by the sea. Acrylic is the medium he prefers, frequently applied with a pallet knife, maintaining a freshness only achieved through working very quickly. His work has a marked ethnic Cornish feel: 'Pearce avoids the temptations of the tourist trap, the chocolate box approach, to come up with compositions that are as personal as they are powerful' (Frank Ruhrmund, art critic and writer).

'My work is always as much about what I eliminate in my painting as it is about what I include. I try to achieve balance by experimentation and elimination, each stage of the development of a composition should be allowed to dictate the creation of the next. These paintings are journeys where each additional layer represents a shift in direction, the body of work represents a continuation of the themes I have been exploring over the past few years. It seems to me that all painting involves illusion - the rearranging of what is real into something different. Often beginning with random spills and splatters, I continue by making increasingly more calculated decisions. Seascape imagery has remained constant in my work, acting as both a point of reference and departure point. The greatest difficulty in painting is to allow each new work to develop itself. What is underneath is as important as what is on the surface, yet vague forms begin to appear and each movement is preserved like tracks in the sand.'

His works have been purchased for collections in the UK, USA, Sweden, Spain and Australia. He has worked in Australia, Denmark and Sweden and has featured in 'Selected Contemporary Artists of Australia' a book by Michael Berry 'Country Living magazine' and 'A Royal Duchy' a Portrait of the Duchy of Cornwall by David Burnett and photographed by Peyto Slatter. A book of his work and a profile of the Artist is published by 'The Great Atlantic Mapworks'.

Samson II Giclee Print 45 x 45cm £195