EXHIBITION: Imagination Unlocked 6

An exhibition of artwork by Bridport-based artists, David Brooke & Caroline Ireland, and guest artist Elaine Dixon, all of whom make interesting work from the imagination, but in very different mediums and styles:

David Brooke’s acrylic paintings are constructed meticulously using very fine brushes and building up the paint in layers to create texture and detail. He has developed a unique style which is all his own and easily recognisable. David’s influences include medieval book illuminations and Romanesque carvings, as well as 20th century British artists, such as Michael Ayrton and Betty Swanwick. His paintings have the feeling of myth and mystery, taking you on a journey into the unknown.

David is a Past President of the Society of Graphic Fine Art, a South West Academician, a member of the Bath Society of Artists and the National Acrylic Painters’ Association. He has successfully shown his paintings in numerous galleries and exhibitions over the past 40 years, and his work is widely collected.

Caroline Ireland uses watercolour, soft pastel and charcoal, often in combination. Starting points for the work come from dream images, music and folk art and she follows threads of inspiration wherever they lead. She often works from improvisation, using random marks or rubbings in charcoal or paint to generate ideas and images. She also works from observation to create colourful still life compositions in soft pastel on black paper.

Caroline is mainly a self-taught artist who has painted all her life. She trained and worked as an archaeologist in the 1970s and 80s in the West Country and East Anglia and decided to become a full time artist when she moved to Bridport in the 1990s with its vibrant artistic community.

Elaine Dixon graduated with a Fine Art Degree in Printmaking from Exeter College of Art in 1982. An enjoyment of the ‘looser’ technique of lithography led her eventually to painting. She attempts to paint human emotions, experiences, events, etc, usually using oil paint on canvas or board. She likes to play with the human form, to exaggerate shape, shrinking, enlarging, in order to attempt expression in her own way. Drawing forms the basis of her practice, using pencil, charcoal, chalk, pastel, conte and ink to bring out her ideas for paintings, or as a pieces of work in their own right. She doodles until the germ of an idea takes shape, or pushes shapes around until the embryo of a drawing or painting is formed.