Richard Whadcock

Richard Whadcock is a British artist who specialises in atmospheric landscape paintings. His contemporary landscapes capture the ever-changing atmospheres of the South Downs and East Sussex coast from silent stillness to squally days. The landscape itself is only a starting point as the painting process takes over. Rather than painting with speed to capture a moment that has already passed, Whadcock aims to create a momentum driving the painting forward as it organically develops around a framework of memory and intuition. A central theme is expanded on or reduced to the basics, reinstating the foundations of the work and creating a sense of amorphous and ambiguous landscape, thus reflecting a sense of place rather than a reality.

 “…I don't think they are immediate paintings. The images enveloped in light and air reveal themselves the more you stand in front of them, if you are willing to let them, in the same way that a real landscape is taken in as you walk through it…”

Light, space and air are present as the central subjects of each painting, more so than the place itself which becomes subdued by the painting as it develops. Elements in the landscape are reduced to marks, lines and shapes that have evolved from the painting process, moving and shifting like the landscape as new possibilities develop. Whadcock’s works draw the viewer in, expanding and bringing small subtleties to the fore over time. Taking inspiration from artists such as Cy Twombly and Robert Motherwell, the influence of these artists can be sensed in the marks made, while Whadcock’s love for jazz music is manifest in the improvised development of each work.