SWEPT OFF YOUR FEET

Sweptoff your FEET

WORDS BY MARTIN HOLMAN

ABOVE iew of the eff ery Camp exhibition at estle arton

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Absorbed by painter Je ery Camp’s poetic vision.

In 1 1 the ritish artist effery am wrote a widely acclaimed boo , a how to manual titled Draw. t became a classic, encouraging its many readers to learn by co ying great artwor s. avid oc ney wrote the foreword and am created all the illustrations, cementing his status as a henomenal draughtsman in the rocess.

am stressed the im ortance of drawing in shar ening observation. y loo ing carefully, we e lore beyond the sha es we e ect to see and nd what is actually there in our surroundings as much as in art. rawing, am wrote, can o en the door and raise that useful e tra eyelid which, li e that ossessed by certain li ards, is in humans the inhibiting, cribbed, con ning, narrow browed, vertical thin ing curtain eyelid of conformity.

onformity is not a word that ts this artist s wor . am had an idiosyncratic a roach and a visionary style. his country has roduced many ainters of the imagination over the centuries who sit uncomfortably within standard categories. am was one of these an outsider inside the art establishment. oyal cademician who e hibited often in the ca ital, he was a romantic with one eye rmly focused on celebrating life in a world of increasing cynicism. is aintings lifted the boundary between reality and dreaming so that the two co e ist in one image.

ne e am le is outh ownlands. his huge canvas was com leted in 1 and, at ust over nine feet across, feels large enough to envelo the body and mind of anyone loo ing at the e traordinary scene that unfolds within it. e become immersed in a tumultuous vision of landsca e, sea and s y. he view oint is so high we could be flying ust li e the nude gures whose oyous aerial gymnastics a ear to whi nature itself into infectious rhythms of ra ture.

he cou le in the icture closest to us hold hands in an arcing bac fli through s ace for a moment we wonder if they are about to s ring out of the frame into our own real s ace. heir elation has already transferred to the eo le who gather and dance on the grassy romontory. t rst, they are hard to ic out among the flowers and above the waves they merge into continuous movement. ecause am erceived the same s irit in every element of his ictures, the same mobile, sensuous lines that have drawn the gures, also form the ground they stand on and the currents of air above. e seldom needed more

INSET ‘ eachy ead, ectacular ro , 1 2 il on canvas on board

TOP effery am in his ondon studio ABOVE ‘ outh ownlands , 1 . ourtesy of rt ace allery

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than a few lines and some deftly brushed brief mar s to give a scene its substance and feeling.

his summer, outh ownlands s ans an entire wall of the gallery at estle arton for its e hibition dedicated to effery am s aintings. his ancient farmstead is now the location for art e hibitions and events, created by aren ownshend. he e hilarating rural setting between anaccan and the elford iver is shared with holiday cottages clustered around the converted stone buildings and shielded by trees. am would have a roved he once remar ed that in summer li e ondon s reen ar to be full of s read eagled bodies, honey golden and in , half tanned against leafy green, seen from a dec chair .

ot sur risingly, the title of the show is ome eople Dream A Lot. he airing of am s aintings with the venue s informal garden and wildflower meadow for the warm ornish summer months is ins ired. ne suits the other li e a glove because, according to ohn ra ton, a leading gure among eo omantic artists in ost war ritain, am was a rare oetic ainter of delight whose radiant visions never cease to ama e and give leasure . he e hibition is a small selection of oil aintings from am s long career. he artist died almost a year ago, aged , but he ainted with the vigour and ris ta ing inventiveness of someone two generations younger. ro riately, therefore, this show the rst since am s death is the choice of one of these younger ainters, an oward irt wor ing with the ondon art dealer, ichael ichardson, who new am well . oward irt is based in t ust in enwith and his interest reflects the uiet influence of am s wor on his rofession. ossibly better nown to the general ublic for his boo s than his aintings, am was held in high regard by fellow artists. he leading ondon based gurative ainter effrey ennis is among them landsca e ainting by effery am , he says, is a sensory call to arms. t is never ust about loo ing at a view it is a stirring embrace, an embodiment of the e erience of being a breathing, sensing erson in that landsca e.

am had a favourite landsca e. eachy ead in ast usse is the highest chal sea cliff in ritain. e discovered this dramatic location after he and his then wife, the ainter aetitia ha , moved to the south coast in the 1 s. art of a range of rolling chal hills and dry valleys of close cro ed turf, this im osing headland featured in his aintings for over years, even after he returned to ondon.

nd des ite this ainter s unconventional inter retation, which a ears to distil multi le bird s eye views into one image, the shoreline geogra hy am ado ted li e an emblem remains recognisable, with its varied flora and sudden descent to the famous red and white stri ed lighthouse below.

he area s distinctive character dramatises the atmos here of eachy ead, ectacular ro 1 2 . he air in the foreground of this ainting stand with the romontory behind and the sea below. hile the woman seems oised as she turns her head towards

INSET ‘ ilac , 2 1 . ourtesy of rt ace allery

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the waves, the man huddles half hidden beside her. e loo s out of the ainting to ma e ambiguous contact with us today, almost years later. n fact, as often ha ens, the two in the foreground are am and ha .

anger seems to stal them in their e osed osition on the cliff. heir hair is blown by a strong wind and the steely grey colours and cold blues accentuate the image s di ying view oint with a sychological dimension. o does an e tra effect, the circular border its ur ose is symbolic, to wra a tornado li e s ectrum of the muted tones around the gures, li e the bevelled edge of a s inning coin. he soft chal of eachy ead is constantly changing, eroded by the elements and chun s sli to the shore all the time. he cliff is also one of the world s most notorious suicide s ots.

his coastal scenery was a revelation to am t is a s ectacular o en s ace, he once said, dramatic and high for a erson born in flat lands. e grew u in his native uffol and after art school in swich and dinburgh, he arrived in ondon as a young rofessional artist. e taught for many years at the lade chool of ine rt where the students found him a roachable and ready to listen and tal about their wor even when it was entirely unli e his own. is articular style of teaching, based on careful loo ing, develo ed there and became the basis of his two o ular boo s. second volume, called aint, was ublished in 1 . n the coast am studied the birds, the weather and the behaviour of wal ers. e found a way of ortraying these e eriences in aint, writing down the ualities that ca tivated him the flowing waters, flowing wind, soaring sails, ulsing hearts, flowing veins, moving gulls, whirring cine lms, ic ing flints, lurching ac daws, owdering chal , gleaming helmets, golden harness, shimmering fabrics of bright colours, the ainting and the thrill, are resented to me in an aerial structure without attachment to the closed ers ectives of the lowlands of my youth.

o ca ture all that, some hallowed traditions had to be trashed. ne was ers ective, the re resentation of solid ob ects on a flat surface that conveys their relative si e, sha e and distance. hen he was writing Draw, am recalled for the art critic ndrew ambirth that the only cha ter ibbed at was on ers ective, because had to say why it was bad. couldn t get on with ers ective. t goes against the natural touch of the eye . o am incor orated several view oints into the same icture, often inverting near and far, and mi ing u large and small. nother eculiarity is the eccentric sha e of his aintings. t estle arton, as well as big rectangular canvases, there are circles and diamond sha es, large irregular edges and sur rising wedges of wood onto which the canvas is attached.

any of the aintings here and most of the smaller ieces were made in the last 2 years of am s life. is sub ect matter varied little during his lifetime with no reduction a arent in his fascination with merging the outward e ressiveness of land, air, sea, flowers and the inner life and of eo le. he universal energy of nature continues to swee multi le

INSET nail, eachy ead . ourtesy of rt ace allery

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sensations together only the scale got smaller. am was a tentative modernist who always e erimented with ways of seeing. aint was dabbed, dotted and stro ed dryly onto canvas, and his colours were always strong and sweet, attuned to inning down the transient beauty he erceived around him.

aturally he made many drawings on the s ot but reserved ainting for the studio. am had a fondness for cut flowers and from 2 11 he wor ed on small canvases that ulse with vibrant colour a subtle irony, erha s, but true to art history where a cut flower is a reminder of inevitable death beauty, it means, is no defence against decay. oward irt erce tively oints out in the attractive boo let accom anying this show that still life ainting also has a second meaning, about being resent.

hat vision translates well to ornwall where the cycle of the seasons is visible in hedgerows and elds, and around its coastline. ndeed, am new the county and featured its sites in one small but brilliant ainting. aetitia and a ornish in ine 1 is not on show at estle arton because it is a ermanent art of ornwall ouncil s schools art collection. ts vivid colours and stylised com osition say much about am s ability to innovate. he unusual design antici ates the sha es he went on to give many of his canvases. aetitia s is the head on the right and am has laced it inside a ainted border imitating the outline of an unfolded ma . s elsewhere, elusive meanings and connections lie below the surface as well as on top.

effery am had an outstanding eye for everyday detail and a lyrical outloo on life. is wor has been bought by ma or collections, such as the ate and the rts ouncil, as well as rivate individuals who have subscribed to his vision. ne rominent merican critic described it as a contem orary form of art that hides art . t its root is observation with eye and mind, as avid oc ney ac nowledged in his foreword to Draw when he wrote in learning to draw unli e learning to write you learn to loo . t s not the beauty of the mar s we li e in writing, it s the beauty of the ideas. ut in drawing it s a bit of both it s beauty of ideas, of feelings and of mar s and thin effery am shows this marvellously well.

Je ery Camp, ome eople Dream a ot is at estle arton until t eptem er .

kestle arton.co.uk

LEFT ‘ eachy ead, ag ies at vening , 1 il on canvas ABOVE estle arton allery from the garden