Local Artist Exhibits at the Peter Scott Gallery

The culmination of ten years’ work by local artist Ann Davidson will be on show at the Peter Scott Gallery from May 9th to June 3rd.

The exhibition entitled “North from Sutherland: Paintings-in-Sections of Sutherland, Iceland and Greenland” has been reviewed by The Times freelance art critic Giles Sutherland who called it “a powerful, evocative and fragilely beautiful set of images”.

Lying at the northern end of mainland Britain, Sutherland - the “Southern Land” of the Vikings - has a spirit of remoteness that was even greater in the post-war years. At that time all but one of its roads were single track. This sparsely populated, vast land was pristine and undiscovered and when Ann went to art school in London she started to paint it because she wanted to show everyone what it was like.

Ann Davidson’s paintings-in-sections are made using a form of collage she has invented. The method is complex but enables a high degree of control with regard to composition.

This exhibition is the result of Ann’s quest to Iceland and Greenland in search of what she calls “Sutherland, exaggerated”.

She said: “I feel that, because of modern developments and global warming, my work has a retrospective angle. Much of Sutherland has lost its pristine look; glaciers in Iceland have been receding; ice in Greenland has been melting. In 2005 I saw, on the Greenland ice-cap, ovals of intense sapphire blue which were lakes of melt water. The Inuit told me that they get less snow than they used to.”

Ann Davidson grew up in Sutherland and has been living in Lancaster since 1979, when her husband Stephen Power joined the staff of the mathematics department of Lancaster University. She has, throughout the years, returned home frequently and gained inspiration for her abstracted landscapes. However, she has produced her work and brought up her family in Lancaster. It means much, therefore, to her to show her work locally, and at Lancaster University.

The original artwork is not for sale but there will be signed, limited edition giclée prints for sale.

The Peter Scott Gallery, part of the Lancaster Institute for the Contemporary Arts, is open from 11am – 5pm Monday – Friday and 11am – 4pm on Saturdays. Entry is free