Artist Residence
Like Big Brother, but with artists
Review
The Artist Residence Hotel in Brig-town's Regency Square is playing host to artist Gillian Westgate throughout June. Itchy's been rubbing shoulders with the artist and her fans at the launch of her exhibition, scoffing olives and supping wine like a true art-loving professional.
The hotel has a rolling programme of artists taking residence for two months before exhibiting their work for the following month. Not only is there a gallery and downstairs studio open to the public for viewing, each room is a canvas, painted by different artists.
Coming to the end of her residency at the hotel where she's been living and working, Gillian's showing off the cream of her crop in the ground floor gallery at the hotel. From brightly coloured carousels and beach huts to beekeepers on tandems, deep blue twilight horizons with the water glistening from lights on the pier to dramatic architectural ink drawings, each piece tells a story of its own, and shows our city through the eyes of an oil-painting genius.
Speaking to Itchy at the launch last Friday, Gillian described how she creates her work:”A lot of it's from memory, I don't have a printer so I can't take photos, I work from sketches. The architectural drawings are done mostly from the hotel; the little buildings down by the West Pier, and also the carousels.“
Much of the work is based on famous artist James McNeill Whistler, the 19th Century painter who used colour to create beautiful nocturne seascapes of luminous quality. For those Itchy-ites who aren't too clued up on Whistler and his work, his most famous painting, Whistler's Mother (a side profile painting of a miserable looking old lady), hung proudly on Mr Bean's front room wall. Her MySpace page blurb describes the unusual combination of subjects as a contrast making the beekeepers disconcertingly anonymous in their protective clothing, in a place synonymous with the undressed. Not the most obvious link, but there is a strange and enduring charm to the work, with its deep pastel colours blending into harsh, bright contrasts. In just six weeks Gillian's knocked up a horde of artworks, all available for sale from £120 for the small paintings to £350 for the larger ones. Gillian's work will be on show throughout June in the hotel's ground floor gallery. Tess Langley www.artistresidence.co.uk
