Rikki Morgan-Tamosunas
Rikki Morgan-Tamosunas is a semi-abstract painter based in Cambridge. After a career in higher education, as a Hispanist specialising in film and cultural studies, she has made her artwork her main creative focus. She works mainly in acrylics and mixed media, often including found and hand-painted collage, and also in oils and drawing.
Her paintings are grouped in series drawn from particular places: Backstreets (Callejeando), from the old streets of Spain and Latin America, where she lived and travelled; Fenland, from the Cambridgeshire fens; Highland, from the mountains of Cumbria and northern Spain; and series on woodland, the coast and flower meadows.
She exhibits widely in Cambridgeshire and beyond, including at the Harley Foundation, Welbeck Abbey, in Nottinghamshire. She joined the Cambridge Drawing Society in 2023, shows regularly in its exhibitions, and takes part in Cambridge Open Studios.
Artist Statement
I am interested in expressing a sense of time and place in my paintings, and I am particularly drawn to places marked by the passage of time and change: peeling layers of paintwork, the crumbling walls of old buildings and ancient backstreets, and the mood and drama of wild and isolated places.
My academic background as a Hispanist (film and cultural studies), and time spent living and travelling in Spain and Latin America, are a rich source of inspiration for my artwork, as are other travels and places with particular meaning for me: the haunting atmosphere of our inscrutable Cambridgeshire fenlands, the rugged landscapes and unpredictable elements of Yorkshire and Cumbria, and my family roots in Wales. My paintings seek to express something of the enigmatic qualities these places embody for me.
I try to create visually textured paintings that draw expressively on colour, line and composition to convey mood and drama. The physical process of layering and mark-making is a way of exploring and understanding my own response to these places and embedding this in the texture of the artwork. I sometimes incorporate fragments of found or hand-painted collage, text or other materials gathered from these places in the moment, sealing a tangible connection to the subject within the fabric of the finished piece. I am fascinated by how these layers and marks nuance the mood and atmosphere of the place and moment as we experience it: traces of past lives, stories and associations we merely glimpse or sense.