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Gerry Halpin
“from studio to gallery”
I visited Gerry Halpin at his studio last year after we had discussed the
activities of the Manchester Academy of Fine Art, of which he was the
president (at the time of writing). My visit was concerned only about
his position as an artist however and I was keen to see (in the flesh) the
work I had seen on various digital media platforms.
I knew of Gerry’s background as an art teacher, and therefore believed
our discussion would be not only interesting for me personally but also
for readers. of painters TUBES magazine. But it was his reason for
painting his subjects that caught my imagination. He has travelled far
and wide over land and sea and it was this ‘travelling’ that inspired him
to paint landscapes from another perspective.
These ‘arial’ landscapes provide the ideal catalyst to produce ‘abstract’
looking work - and with the addition of visual memory and choice
of colour palette extends them from ‘the norm’ to the unusual and
attractive. Gerry paints these ‘images’ in varying sizes and shapes
depending on the ‘shapes’ that he feels best fit in with what he has seen
and what he has imagined.
The colour lines of the work are complimentary, sometimes vivid and
often surprising. He showed me a large canvas in luscious blues that I
really liked…here is what he has to say about the work that he has been
creating for some time, this what he had to say about his work;
“Travelling further afield to places such as Mauritius,
Madagascar, Zambia, Borneo and Australia afforded me that
‘eureka moment’ of ‘seeing’ the landscape in an entirely different
way than what I was more familiar with.
Seeing the world from above rather than being in it and looking
across, brought an exciting new challenge in ways of observing
and recording the landscape. Looking down on the world meant
that I could see the ordinary features of
a landscape in an extraordinary way and I had to find new
methods of painting in order to represent that new perspective. “
Gerry is an accomplished professional artist and it is not surprising
to learn that he has exhibited and is collected widely, but ‘landscape’
although a passion, is not the only subject he paints. Figurative works
also play a part in his port folio. Once again these paintings of ordinary
people in ordinary places are treated as a composition of form and
colour. He employs the same range of tonal vibrance to these as he does
in his landscape work, which gives them their ‘collectable’ label for
many galleries around the UK.
top right: Arrival V11 - Burnt Earth ref:PGH28
middle: Aerial V11- Coast Tamil Nadu.E India ref: PGH29
bottom right: Figures (urban) ref:PGH30
all images ©Gerry Halpin
Photograph by Denis Taylor ©Tubes magazine 2018
Summary by Denis Taylor ©painters Tubes magazines