PAUL MORRISON
Posted by Jenn | Posted in | Posted on Friday, April 10, 2009
On the 26th of March, me and my mum visited Manchester Art Gallery just down the road from piccadilly gardens.
These two pictures represent 'Parthenocarp', I couldn't find a full version of the actual painting, and I got these images off the Manchester art gallery website. It really is absolutely massive, and I think that is what I like about it along with it's style also. I feel that the style of his paintings really draw me in, they make me want to go closer and look at the detail. They are very striking.
All I was doing was just casually looking around and taking things in, I didn't go for a specific purpose, but one artist that I stumbled across was Paul Morrison who was born in Liverpool in 1966. I had never heard of him before, but all we did was walk into a section of the art gallery and a massive piece of his work covering the whole wall just hits you in the face, it was a fantastic feeling. Many of the paintings were in black and white and he uses really bold shapes to make up the flowery gardens etc. They depict quite an eerie feel to the paintings due to the sheer size of the flowers - this is especially evident in the 25 metre-long wall painting 'Parthenocarp' created exclusively for Manchester Art Gallery in 2009. It is the major feature of the galleries current exhibition of work by the contemporary British artist.
His influences for this style of painting comes from a range of mediums. Cartoons to paradigms from art history/of landscape predecessors, from durer via Monet to Lichtenstein, to create abstracted and enlarged visions of landscape. 
He alters his images on the computer and projects them onto a surface, he then outlines each element in pencil and applies black paint....
He makes it seem so easy, and I think one day I would love to produce something similar, this work has inspired me.
The below picture shows the style that I think represents my own personal taste and style.
Also, in the Manchester Art Gallery shop I found a Lichtenstein book, I love his pieces of work, they all have such character and atmosphere. My passion for him started when I visited The Louvre gallery when I went traveling and saw a few of the originals there.
It's great when you stumble upon an exhibition without prior notice.
That said, have you been to the 'Subversive Spaces' exhibition at the Whitworth gallery (on till june)