TOM BARNETT

Untitled (Sky)
pigment on paper on board
 122 x 94cm

What are you working on in your studio right now?

Since March this year I've been making new works that are concerned with the memory of a trip to India from the previous year.

 

Can you describe your working routine?

I have two very different tempos in my studio. While the thinking, preparing & finishing can often take along time & at a slow pace the mark making & physical gestures are predominately fast & often frenetic. However, although a painting is made up of these quick actions, it may have multiple layers that are in turn punctuated by long periods of slow reflection. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Can you describe your studio space and how, if at all, that affects your work?

 

I always attempt to maintain some neatness & order but in reality if my studio isn't a wash with pigment, paper scraps, pencils & pastels then I'm not really busy. I find the best works inspire some chaos but coming from an ordered beginning.

 

 

 

Tell me about your process, where things begin, how they evolve etc.

 

Pigment & the action of spreading it around beautifully flat, clean plains is a key process at the moment. The moment that an inspired decision takes hold of previously methodical tasks is where a work begins. Before that its memories, photos, dreams, wider reading/looking etc. After its colour and shape inspiring a response.

 paper

 

 

 

 

What are you having the most trouble resolving?

 

The difficulty of transposing the simplicity of small sketches into large scale works.

 

 

 

Do you experiment with different materials a lot or do you prefer to work within certain parameters?

 

I used to use anything & everything & embrace the endless choice that gave me. Now I enjoy giving myself parameters within which to work. All that energy spent respecting different materials can now be focused on the subtler differences within one material, one subject. Like light, tone & feel.

 

 

 

 

Untitled (Train)
 pigment on paper on board
153 x 122cm

 

 

 

 

What does the future hold for this work?

 

There is a familiarity to work I made when I was younger in the desire to work again with colour, line and layers. But the inspiration was my trip to India & so I plan to go again & develop this body of abstracted landscape painting further.

 

 

 

Untitled (Brown)
pigment on paper on board
153 x 122cm