News — Norfolk
Launch of 'Linear Lands' Original Oil Paintings Collection
2020 saw the start of a whole new portfolio of paintings for artist Jac Scott. Fluid Lands emerged through the lockdown as the artist was able to dedicate significant studio time to developing the new work with pigments and wax. The Storm Collection was the initial response now followed by Linear Lands.
Each work is a unique response to local Norfolk sea and land scapes.
Inspiration - Linear Lands Collection
North Norfolk, with its big skies and undulating vistas, specialises in creating layered wide and sinuous bands of landscape.
There is a rhythmic poetry where the bands of interest stretch across the land forming stripes of colour, texture and form. This striping delineates and dissects the panorama leading to an inspiration that explodes across the canvas - broad strokes of emotion and energy captured in paint.
Technique - Encaustic Painting
The ancient method of encaustic art was practiced by the Greeks and Egyptians with 2000 year old examples still in existence. Wax and pigments are fused with heat which dries quickly capturing brush strokes, drips and textures. Encaustic art is an all consuming very physical practice. One is seduced by the process of not just applying paint with a brush, palette knife or hands, but also the harnessing of heat to energise materials and move the liquids around. The fluidity of the process allows the materials to mix and metamorphose.
East View, Burnham Overy Staithe, Norfolk
The coastal path elevates the walker to view a wide vista of lines on the landscape where reeds, stream, bank, grass, hedge and sky form natural bands.
Phacelia, Hindolveston, Norfolk
Bands of wonder in a local meadow where phacelia forms a lacy border to rustling wheat, dwarfed by a row of Scots pines.
Phacelia is a wonder plant. It has beautiful scented purple flowers with dense fern-like foliage. It smothers weeds and has an extensive root system that improves soil structure - it is often used as a green manure. It grows quickly showing blooms for 6-8 weeks - providing an excellent cut flower and one of the top flowers for bees and hoverflies.
Launch of Fluid Lands: original oil & wax paintings by Jac Scott
Fluid Lands
All artworks in this collection are originals by Jac Scott.
Utopia do not create prints from these paintings.
Encaustic Art
The ancient method of encaustic art was practiced by the Greeks and Egyptians with 2000 year old examples still in existence. Wax and pigments are fused with heat which dries quickly capturing brush strokes, drips and textures. Encaustic art is an all consuming very physical practice. One is seduced by the process of not just applying paint with a brush, palette knife or hands but also the harnessing of heat to energise materials and move the liquids around. The fluidity of the process allows the materials to mix and metamorphose.
Artist’s Inspiration
The collection is a narrative from the Covid-19 lockdown where the staying home mantra led to a visceral response in oil paint and wax, to places long remembered. No longer able to embrace the wide vistas of the Norfolk sea and land scapes, that the artist’s spirit yearned to revisit, she decided to indulge in some highly emotive abstracted work that would kindle a long repressed flame.
Seeing Scarlet
In June, North Norfolk is particularly blessed with wide ribbons of scarlet poppies. The flashes of red shout loudly amongst other more timid wild flowers. The meadows appear to dance in the breeze each flower pirouetting on the beat.
Red is a colour not normally associated with Utopia, but at this time of year, living in North Norfolk, one cannot but wonder at its enchantment. It started with a view of three scarlet fields at the gateway to Creake Abbey, followed by a surprise sight of another glorious poppy meadow on our journey to Wiveton Hall to pick strawberries.
The lush crop of succulent fruit beckoned us in to devour its abundance. Gathering strawberries for jam making feels a real treat on a sunny day in Norfolk – bend, forage, find and basket, repeat, bend, forage, find and basket - gathers a slow momentum. Seduced by the all-pervading sweet heart fragrance, the basket fills itself easily.
The heady aroma transports to the kitchen where jam pan and boiling fruit meld before warmed jars. Apron once green now splashed and scrumbled with red sticky handprints and sweet smiles of endless setting tests. Labelled pots of red goodness parade in the store cupboard – North Norfolk delights abound.
For red lovers we have an exotic design of rich red hues, Pheasant Fancy is one our exclusive limited edition lamp shades, and it’s illumination creates a warming glow.
Drawing Conclusions
Drawing Conclusions
To re-tread footprints on a favourite walk, where sky and sea and earth meet and buffer, is a treat even on a windy, grey January day. The North Norfolk coastline is a sanctuary to wildlife and people – an ethereal interface that inspires and nurtures.
We surrender to the elements - embrace the gash of wind and rain and hear the roar of tide and turn.
See 37 seconds of a panoramic video of the windy walk at Cley.
What inspires artists to capture something - a stimulus that sparks an exhilarating ignition to respond. The stark winter landscapes of North Norfolk, with their strong graphic qualities, contrive a creative approach where the editing out of features is as much the artistic remit as what one includes. This challenging duality delivers sparse vistas with intricate detailing in the forms.
The Land Song Collection has emerged organically from the seasonal study of the East Anglian countryside and coastline. It aims to reflect the quiet song where a rhythmic beauty is broken by staccato: tree, farm and village. The drawings are direct responses to actual sites that can be visited through the name or grid references supplied with each print. The Collection will continue to evolve and expand as the sky’s envelope opens.
Cley Windmill
The ghost of the mill sails turn to the rhythm of the historic wind.
Burnham Norton
In Burnham Norton, marshes wrap and ooze watery ribbons of grey sky. Reeds form natural weather vanes swaying in the breeze whilst beyond the edge, where watery and aerial worlds collide: creatures dance in the interface embracing the fluctuating borders of their habitat.
