Untitled Document

Wendy Winfield

A Background to Wendy Winfield's Work

Wendy Winfield was born in London and studied at Kingston School of Art and The Courtauld School of Art. In the 1970s she was a pupil with the Abstract Expressionist painter Abraham Rattner in New York and more recently with the Bomberg-influenced school of painters under Roy Oxlade in Tunbridge Wells in the late 1980s.

After a career in advertising, Winfield turned to full-time artistic practice in the 1980s. Her teaching experience dates from a period before this when she worked in secondary education. In the last few years she has provided GCSE A and O level students with individual tutoring.

Winfield has exhibited annually for several years in group shows mainly in London, and has a solo London show every 2-3 years.

Easter Day 30x42 inches, oil on canvas

Wendy Winfield's work is figurative and takes its inspiration from a study of motifs including landscape figure composition and still life. It is informed by the paintings of Matisse and American and European Expressionism. Bold colour and expressive gesture are central to Winfield's painting and drawing

For Winfield the process of painting is as important as the end result. The paint is manipulated, layered, allowed to drip, rubbed-in, scraped away and generally assertively used. Sometimes the organization of the painting, the two-dimensional composition, colour and drawing are determined in advance, at other times these dimensions must be flexible in order to achieve a result. Colour which generally establishes mood is likely to be the initial stimulus to starting to paint and is likely to be the one constant but even this may be subject to change

The importance of drawing from observation is an important feature of Winfield's work. Most summers she spends time in France or Italy working out of doors directly from nature both drawing and painting. "I have visited Languedoc four or five times to paint, and love the wildness of the terrain, the changing light and temperamental weather. But the wonderful thing is that you can

always find a sunny sheltered spot to set out your paints and get to work. What I love about working en plein air is the total unpredictability of it. You dont know where it will take you or what you will end up with!" As the artist notes: " My interest is to capture the character of motif - figures or landscape - together with using the medium strongly and directly."

Please see a selection of Wendy's work below.