HUNG Gallery, Inverness, until 28 February 2011

THIS month HUNG gallery’s downstairs space features paintings by Galloway-based artist Amy Winstanley.

A BA (Hons) graduate of Edinburgh College of Art in 2005, Winstanley’s latest series of abstract oils on canvas create a sense of balance and ambiguity that invite closer inspection. Her fluid handling of paint is coupled with a strong sense of design, achieving balance between elements of line, colour and form, and leading the eye into imaginative contemplation of the work.

Detail from Amy Winstanley's Immersed 1

Untitled 3, a landscape format composition in three panels, is a good example. Read left to right concentration of colour and form expands into open space; a dominant palette of purples, blues and yellow dissipates into elusive opaque white, a sparse tracery of forms emerging from the ground. The image presents the viewer with multiple pathways of interpretation and ambiguity between man made and organic inspiration.

In the mindscape of this landscape you could read urban concentration and natural catastrophe or the inspiration of robust landforms and stone against a white expanse of sky. Whether perceiving the emptiness of ruins and debris or the mark of time upon the natural environment, the composition presents a sweeping, monumental view and a progression of pictorial elements that allow the viewer’s mind to enter into the work in pursuit of their own journey.

Immersed 5 also presents a wonderful sense of compositional balance in the tonal division of the canvas diagonally, the articulation of line preserving the immediate response of a drawing and the handling of paint from washes to thicker impasto. The cool palette of greys, blue and yellow and almost figurative suggestion of form; like a kneeling figure with the head compressed into the high left hand corner of the painting creates a confined psychological space reminiscent of Egon Schiele.

Amy Winstanley's Immersed 3

Immersed 3 feels like a still life of energy; a composition in whites, greys, intense purple and lemon yellow spun into concentrated, yet delicate form. The weight of purple in the lower right of the composition operates in visual counterpoint to the positive space surrounding it. There is subtlety in this work which cannot be translated into reproduction and at the same time a manipulation of pictorial elements that can at times feel formulaic when viewed in a sequence of consecutive works. However when Winstanley utilises intuition and design to create depth, not just spatially but emotionally, the results are impressive and it will be interesting to see this dynamic developed further in future work.

Upstairs, HUNG features paintings, drawings, photography, original prints, bespoke clothing and jewellery with featured artists including; Gordon Robin Brown, Denise Davis, Alisa Hughes, Ladyface, Gavin Downie, Jennifer Houliston, Fiona Kearney, Jamie MacLean, Joane Ross, Mhairi Cameron, Fiona Byrne and Jiri Krystlik. This month the gallery will also continue to host its popular Speedcrafting events with Cupcakes and Cocktails on 17th February between 7 and 10pm.

© Georgina Coburn, 2012

Links

• Amy Winstanley
• HUNG Gallery
• HUNG on Facebook