Lionel Playford

Born Leeds, W Yorkshire, 1959I work from a new studio in the remote hills of the North Pennines in Cumbria having moved from an inner city studio in Newcastle upon Tyne. My perspective on the landscape is informed by this earlier urban experience. I believe that good interesting and relevant art can be made outside of large cities but that it helps to be in touch with what is happening at the centre.I make mostly oil painted landscapes about what I see on my travels on a daily basis. I also make abstract stripe paintings originally inspired by the US flag from my time in Cleveland Ohio and by tidal esturies. From time to time I make portrait paintings. My landscape drawings make use of natural materials under my feet like peat, earth, clay and shale as well, as found, non-toxic, man made materials. I am inspired indirectly by 20th century artists like John Piper, Andy Goldsworthy, Anselm Kiefer, Graham Sutherland, Winifred Nicholson, Peter Lanyon, Richard Diebenkorn to name but a few.

1999- MFA Newcastle University
1998- Exchange, Cleveland Institute of Art, Ohio, USA.
1991-BFA Newcastle Polytechnic,