Christine Basil

My surroundings are the springboard for my inspiration. My paintings are therefore representative. However, I have no desire to produce a photographic representation. I am trying to capture something of the harmony I perceive, to find the source of the emotional response to what I see around me, especially in the landscape.

I spent my early childhood deep in the heart of North Devon, where children were free to play in the fields, streams and woods.

On Sundays the melodic peel of the church bells tumbling over the hills from the nearest village, and in summer the tinkling of an ice cream van or the sound of a tractor hardly disturbed the sights and sounds of nature, birdsong, the wind rustling the leaves of trees and a gently babbling stream.

 Such a feeling of harmony is hard to find in our electrified concrete jungle, so I take my easel and search for places which evoke this sense of serenity. This is called 'en plein air' painting and is the only way to really observe the behaviour of light. Sometimes these studies are fresh and interesting enough to exhibit and other times they serve as ideas for more resolved  studio work. Each approach requires a different methods and carries a different type of messages.

This is my way of knowing and explaining myself in relation to the world.