Wendy J. Allen
Wendy J Allen is an East Anglian artist based in the Suffolk village of Acton, near Sudbury, where she works from a garden studio three miles from Gainsborough's birthplace. She studied Art & Design in Suffolk and completed postgraduate studies in Art & The Book at Colchester, working as a book artist and printmaker before returning to painting. She now works primarily in acrylics and mixed media, building layered, expressionist works that are abstract evocations of emotion, often inspired by the landscape and natural world. She teaches drawing and painting classes at Mill Tye Gallery, Great Cornard, and is a member of Colchester Art Society and Art Tribe.
Artist Statement
My paintings evolve in an intuitive, stream of consciousness way that I hope conveys the awe I feel in the landscape and natural world in general and my faith in God, the Supreme Creator. I love colour and in some ways, each canvas or board is an exploration of and engagement with colour. Although I have many photos as visual cues, and I use sketchbooks to record ideas and colours I've mixed, my work is much more about memory and the feel of the places I've been. I have always wanted to preserve the beauty I see but in a way that conveys how I feel about it. I have lived long enough to accumulate a wealth of memories – mountains and waterfalls, streams and meadows, crashing waves and winter storms. The great thing about such a mental image is that it includes the feelings, the experience of the place. Wind in your hair, the smell of brine in the air, the thunder of water on rocks, the electricity you felt that day in that place. This is what informs my work, although the relationship to such things is often not apparent until the piece is nearing completion. Titles come last! They are simply a way of cataloguing the work. The piece might well mean something completely different to you than it does to me. In fact, I hope it does.