Using nature and landscape as her points of departure, abstract expressionist painter Alison Britton-Paterson creates light filled journeys into the places between what we see and what we feel. Through bold, evocative brush marks, sweeping charcoal or graphite lines and smudges and the use of palette knives, she weaves her texture to achieve a tactile surface which offers a timeless balance between the concealed and the exposed.
Although Britton-Paterson prepares for each piece by spending time out in the landscape with camera and sketchbook, the material she brings back to her studio is never a direct influence; rather, it feeds into the broader story of each composition. Many of the photographs are simply of shapes, colours or textures that draw her eye, and these become a part of the source for expressing her own emotional connection to the world.
Britton-Paterson describes her artwork as connecting to “a shared idea of the unrestricted self that still finds joy in a fleeting glimpse of light and shade. This takes form in its abstract nature, I try not to invoke emotions with representational imagery from my surrounding, but rather lead the viewer into their own.” For this reason she keeps her titles ambiguous and each work offers a reflection of the viewer’s own thought, inviting them to find their own meaning “Maybe they'll see something that I didn't even intend for them to see. I feel that's part of the beauty of art.”
A self-taught artist, Britton-Paterson began to exhibit her work in 2016 when she was accepted to be part of a group show. This was followed by a whirlwind of invitations to exhibit in galleries across the UK. Her distinctive style and interpretation combined with the extreme beauty of her luminous work has already won her recognition as an emerging artist of genuine substance and originality.
Art critic Kate Reeve-Edward writes: “Although Britton-Paterson's work vibrates with melodramatic paint-strokes, the minutiae of the mark making is not lost. The scrawls are interspersed with deliberate and controlled marks which pull the viewer's eye expertly, ensuring depth of field. This allows her paintings to retain a controlled and finished quality amongst the energy.”
