The Wonder of Art

What are the chances that you will visit a gallery in the morning on the first day of a new show and find the artist in attendance? Not unlikely but then again not too certain if the actual reception is set for that evening.
Then what are the chances, if it is your good fortune that the artist is in attendance, that you've only had eight hours sleep after being awake for the previous 32 hours? In my case that's exactly what happened on my first full day in London in early May.


The Gallery in question was Richmond Hill Gallery in Richmond, London. The artist was Philip Sutton RA, an artist I only discovered a few years ago but whose work I fell in love with for its expressiveness and exuberant colour.

Although I was coherent enough to recognise Mr Sutton that was as far as my speaking abilities went as I groped for the ability to ask and answer questions. Despite doing a fair impression of a half-wit, Mr Sutton was very gracious and talked to me for a while about the way he decided to paint compared with his contemporaries in the 1950's.

In a better frame of mind, I could have thought of many good questions to ask  but I also wouldn't have wanted to take up too much of his time. I loved seeing the paintings which were inspired by a trip to Crete.

As I was leaving I was invited to attend the evening's private view (which I was sadly unable to attend - although I feel that I had my own private viewing that morning) and one of the ladies manning the gallery very generously gave me a copy of the show's accompanying book and DVD. As tired as I was, I floated back down the street.

What a highlight and brilliant way to start my visit. For me it was a magical moment.

To photograph part of the book to illustrate this post I placed the book on my palette box and realised that the colours from the last painting I did before my trip were very close to those in the painting on the cover.