The Foyer Gallery

Our exhibition is SENSE OF PLACE: Carolyn Earlam and Adrian Swales

PREVIEW: Monday 17th January, 6.30pm

EXHIBITION: Tuesday 18th January - Friday 4th March (see below for viewing times)

Carolyn and Adrian both work directly from the landscape, both urban and rural, aiming to re-create a sense of the particularities of place. Their individual styles are distinct but complimentary, providing a colourful and stimulating response to the visual environment.

Carolyn Earlam

Carolyn Earlam studied Fine Art at Newcastle University and later completed an MA in Fine Art at Sunderland University. She worked for many years in Art and Design Education, as a teacher and as an inspector. She now paints full time and has regularly exhibited her work across the region. Most of her work is developed from direct landscape studies, both drawings and paintings made en plain air and her photographs.

She is interested experimenting with different media and techniques to evoke atmosphere and a sense of place and has been particularly inspired by many visits to the islands of the Outer Hebrides. Her recent work is developing a greater focus on the elements of colour, space, line and pattern and becoming less representational.

Adrian Swales

Adrian took a degree at Brighton Art College after completing a foundation course in his home city of Hull. He taught art in Birmingham and Skegness before working as an art therapist in 1972, at St Nicholas Hospital in Newcastle. For the past 35 years he has worked as an oil painting restorer whilst continuing to do his own work.

Although his work is figurative, he is interested in the abstracts of painting - how a picture is constructed, composition (of which colour is an essential element) and how the marks are made. However, the painting must still be true to the place or the person or the atmosphere. He builds up a painting from a series of sketches and photographs creating a collage from which he works.

During lockdown he began to look at his surroundings afresh and was struck by the grandeur of the Tyne bridges - an opportunity to see the beauty in the familiar.

VIEWING TIMES

The exhibition is showing from Tuesday 18th January to Friday 4th March and can be viewed Monday to Friday 10.30am –1pm. Please check the Box Office is open before making a trip in person.

Non performance nights: Monday & Wednesday, 7.30 – 8.30pm.

Performance nights (18th-22nd January; 8th-12th February; 24th-26th February): from 6.30pm.

For information about small group visits and for viewings outside of these hours please email gallery@peoplestheatre.co.uk