OUT OF THE ORDINARY: Jane Cruickshank solo exhibition
Scottish Art: Contemporary Paintings by Jane Cruickshank
The latest exhibition at Red Rag Gallery features Scottish artist Jane Cruickshank who is gaining a reputation for her luminous fine art still life and figure painting; a reputation that will no doubt be enhanced by this remarkable solo exhibition, which is now open at the Red Rag Gallery in Stow on the Wold, Gloucestershire.
Paintings from Jane have been a regularly shown at the gallery for the last five years but this is her first solo exhibition with Red Rag. It focuses on her still life work and includes delicately defined paintings of vessels of different materials (ceramic, metallic), household items (such as scissors), fruit and books – in each case helping us to see how the ordinary and the day-to-day reveal the extraordinary as we take time to observe them.
Although this exhibition will concentrate on Jane’s still life work, her initial interest was in painting figures – during her studies she concentrated on producing representational figures placed in large minimal spaces to evoke a sense of isolation and vulnerability. She is fascinated with the play and effects of light and shadow on a figure or object and creating a strong presence within a space. She says, “I started painting the figure while at Art College, mainly self-portraits or members of the family usually on large canvases with the figure placed off centre to create an image of vulnerability. Pattern and surface is a tool that I use to explore how the dominance of appearance manipulates the identity.”
Her paintings have all the quality and depth associated with her principal medium of oils, successfully combining intense realism with a luminescence and clarity that give them a very contemporary feel. Her work is immediately accessible. Red Rag Gallery Manager, Carole Teagle comments, “We are delighted to host this fascinating solo show by Jane Cruickshank. There is a gentleness and peace to Jane’s still life paintings that gives them an enduring quality and causes us to take time to ponder and reflect, a precious offering of stability at a time of fast movement and change.”
NOTES Jane Cruickshank BA (Hons), MA (b. 1976, Speyside) studied Fine Art at Gray’s School of Art in Aberdeen from 1994-99. She was commended in the Coopers and Lybrand Competition (1996); won a John Kinross Scholarship to Florence (1997), awarded by the Royal Scottish Academy in Edinburgh; and won the James Torrance Memorial Award from the Royal Glasgow Institute (1998). She has exhibited extensively, particularly in Scottish Art Galleries where she has already presented a number of solo exhibitions.
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