wendy Dison artist
Painting is my primary artistic expression and my passion in life. The root of my practice is always drawing; whether walking the soft hills of West Cork or the limestone mountains of southern Spain I observe and I sketch. My studio work is an ongoing conversation with these sketches. What emerges from these deliberations might be paintings, prints or sculpture. Much of the work reflects the experience of living in West Cork and my response to the people, history and traditions of the rural west of Ireland. For several years much of my work was in some way concerned with the idea of ‘shelter’, be it physical or emotional, within the landscape. I like to explore dichotomies: shadow and light, external and internal spaces, and the interplay between representation and abstraction. More recently I have explored the concept of absence and by extension, grief which became a particular focus after the death of my mother.
I was born in Liverpool in 1948 and studied at Liverpool School of Art and Bristol Polytechnic between 1969 and 1974. After travelling extensively, and living in Spain and Mexico, I settled in West Cork, Ireland in 1999.