Moments With Dad - June 25th - July 7th 2024, At The Chair -A Gallery at Hay on Wye.

UPDATE:- The Show has been extended for a week. If you wish to visit Hay to come and see it here is a guide of other things to do here:

https://roadbook.com/london/travel/hay-on-wye-hotels-restaurants-things-to-do/

20/06/2024 Press Release: 

An Exhibition of Paintings and Drawings by Tom Evans.

Moments with Dad will be presented this June at the Chair, Hay-on-Wye, showcasing Tom Evans' most expansive collection to date. The exhibition delves into his enigmatic approach to portraiture, everyday life, and familial bonds.

This series of work is in one sense deeply personal, shaped by Tom’s experience of living with his father on Tom’s journey to become an artist, and his father’s acceptance of this path. On the other, the work invites the viewer to reflect on themes of nostalgia, memory, perception and rediscovery.

Tom's portraits capture essences of moments with his father, revealing a profound yet intangible connection. They evoke introspection and the poignant beauty found in shared moments and solitary reflections. 

In ‘A Private Spy’ (2023), an ordinary beachside leisure scene takes on a whimsical allure with details like bright blue shoes, the long hair sticking out, the relaxed, unself-conscious recline beside green iron railings. The title is named after the book his father is reading, written by John Le Carré, who his father once met. This painting evokes a sense of fantastical immersion. Despite his outward sternness and age, the figure is engrossed in an inner world sparked by recollection and imagined adventures.

 ‘The Card Player (V1)’ (2023) pays homage to modernist masters like Cezanne, its informal setting and arrangement of objects such as a coffee pot and clock echoing the iconic compositions. Red uno cards at the centre add a playful, decisively contemporary touch.

The painting is affectionately known as ‘Papa Uno’. 

 Evans' mastery of colour is central to his work: cool blue tones imbue his father’s face with a stoic, monumental quality, removed from naturalistic representation. This chromatic choice is deftly counterbalanced by warm accents of yellow ochre in the upper right corner, harmonising with delicate shades of light green on the cupboards and a vibrant splash of light blue on the table at the lower left. ‘The Card Player (V1)’ exudes joy found in the everyday rituals of life but also a passing of time.

‘Dad Again,’ (2023) captured in a moment of surprise, exudes raw  realism. Tom’s brushwork vividly portrays the weathered face, expressive eyes, and tousled hair, imbuing the skin with texture and contrasting colours that convey a psychological depth and weight of experience.

 Throughout Moments with Dad, Evans' exploration spans from oil paintings to vibrant pastels, offering viewers an intimate insight into his creative process. These artworks reveal a tender dialogue between artist and sitter, reflecting a deepening understanding between father and son on their intertwined journeys, inviting viewers to reflect on their own relationships and evolving dynamics.

—  Rosalie Clement Hennion

Notes to Editors

Biography: Tom Evans (b.Barnet, 1978) obtained a BA in Painting from Chelsea College of Arts, graduating in 2000. After a hiatus focusing on more commercial areas of creativity, he returned to the UK from a time spent living and working abroad, in Madrid, Spain, to re-focus on establishing a fine art practice from his home base in rural Monmouthshire at the end of 2017. Tom spent 2022 studying with The Royal Drawing School on their inaugural Online Drawing Development Year, shortly thereafter gaining a place on the final Zabludowicz Masterclass in 2023. He then gained the support of the Arts Council of Wales through their Creative Steps programme as a neurodivergent artist, which allowed him to spend the last academic year completing the Turps Banana Correspondence Course. Tom has recently completed several residencies in Portugal and has also shown work in Wales, London and abroad. His work is included in several private collections. Tom will begin an MA at London's Royal College of Art in September 2024.

The exhibition will take place at The Chair, A Gallery in Hay on Wye. 

10 High Town, Hay-on-Wye HR3 5AE, 25th-30th June 10-4pm (until 2pm on Sun 30th)

A private view will take place on Thursday 27th, 6-8.30pm. All welcome.

For further info please contact the artist on 07870 241876 / etomevans@gmail.com

A pdf of further available works is accessible upon request.

Pada Winter Residency, Barriero, (Lisbon, Portugal)

Housed in a former factory building in Barreiro, a separate city to Lisbon on its south shore (accessible by a 20 mins ferry ride), this residency complex founded in 2018 hosts artists for residency periods, normally lasting a month or two, throughout the year. This January I completed a 3 week ‘Winter Residency’ which was more self led than usual.

With generously allocated studio spaces for 9 artists of diverse backgrounds and career stages a small community forms which makes the overall experience similar to an art school mixed with a sort of gathering vibe. Shared meals and excursions to Lisbon and beyond (e.g Sintra) helped us bond and share our enthusiasm for art while learning about and from each other. We also made visits to Lisbon galleries together and to a notable private view of another residency called la junqueira.

We were housed in former worker’s cottages just 2 mins from the studios to which we had 24 hour access, so there was a great opportunity to make considerable progress with my practice while experimenting with new approaches. In the first week, Tim Ralston who runs PADA took us on a tour of the adjacent restricted former industrial zone and many of us, including me reacted to this.

Oil pastel sketches of the industrial zone next to PADA completed in week 1.

Following on from my sketches, I was asked to paint a portrait, which lead to a series of three, before I resolved to experiment while I had the space to do so with some large group portraits using images taken from excursions out of the compound.

Working on a new surface to me (Jute) demanded that I apply the paint more thickly to the surface.

Early stages of Ferry Terminal @ Midnight version 1.

My pictures drying.

The 3 weeks culminated in a small exhibition which we initiated as a group. It was a great chance for us to reflect together on what had been accomplished.

The ‘private view’.

It was sad to clear the studios out at the end of the experience, but great to reflect on a fortunate few weeks absorbed in making art with like-minded artists.

My amazing and generous studio space at Pada

View from the top of the Moorish castle at Sintra.

In being nudged into making work in a more direct fluid fashion I was reminded that knowing when to stop and when to abandon a composition is paramount.

Early stages of Ferry Terminal @ Midnight version 2.

Painting the famous Pastel De Nata from life. (version 1)

From an excursion to Cascais.

A Big Thank You to the other artists:

Katya Derksen
Arthur Gazzola van de Zand
Amanda Houchen
Lisa Birke
Mark Richards
Angela Solis ONeill
Jason Manley
Donna Campbell

+ Noelle Kalom (Alumni Cottage)

And thanks to Tim Ralston of Pada.

Awesome to meet you all!

Sunday morning in Lisbon.

Training With The Welsh Academy Of Art

Since the beginning of June 2023, after a bit of a break from practising (I had what turned out to probably have been covid as I coughed so hard I actually broke a rib), and after attending a wedding in Spain, I’ve been drawing again at the studios of the Welsh Academy of Art, not far from me. It’s run by Lucy, a lady who trained at the Charles H Cecil studios in Florence, which is renowned for giving artists a grounding in the classical techniques as practised by the old masters, through three years of rigorous academic training.

The Academy here exists as one of very few in the UK that pass on such a learning experience at home, and it has so far been a really great opportunity to set aside a month and get a grasp of a particular set of skills that I hope will feed into and improve the quality of my work overall going forward.

The eye of Michelangelo’s David

Still life (week two).

All initiates begin by drawing casts and still lives in charcoal, the same size on the paper as they are to the eye, by standing back at a marked position on the studio floor to observe and measure with a piece of thread and a mirror, before walking backwards and forwards repeatedly to make marks on the page. I have begun to progress into oil painting with a limited palette and am looking forward to working with a live model over the next few weeks.

Drawing from a plaster cast of St Jerome.

The start of a painting with just Raw Umber and Ivory Black.

Portrait of a live model (Mark) using the sight/size method.

Starting to paint using ‘sight-size’ from a cast with just ‘white, black and raw umber’.

Group Show Studio 22

This March, the cohort I studied with over last year (2022) called ‘Studio 22’ held a show together for a fortnight at The Green and Stone Gallery in Chelsea. I exhibited several images from the pastel series of my dad. He was in attendance. Everyone recognised him straight away from the works (see below).

Ray Evans with England vs Senegal.

It was a compliment to have had one of my images chosen (one of 2 out of about 80+ pictures) as a poster image for the show by the Royal Drawing School tutors Rachel Mercer and Paul Fenner.

Poster for the Studio 22 show.

It was wonderful to show alongside such a lovely talented group of fellow artists!

Residency at The Arts House Aveiro 2023

From late January to early March 2023 I spent 5 weeks on a great residency at The Arts House Aveiro, Portugal (about 45 mins south of Oporto), which was facilitated by a grant from a local fund in South Wales. During that time the vibrant colours of the buildings and boats (Aveiro is known as the Venice of Portugal) and the atmosphere of the coastal location by the Atlantic greatly influenced my working process.

A random building in Aveiro typical of the bright colours there.

I started off responding to the local environment in pastel, then after a conversation with the curator Tiago at the Gulbenkian Foundation space in the city, I settled on spending three weeks making a series of portraits of the people I met there. Mainly a music school supported by the prestigious cultural foundation, the exhibition space where I held the culminating show (below), was an auditorium where intermittent yet regular contemporary art shows are held.

Work in situ at The Gulbenkian Foundation space Aveiro.

My room at the Arts House, Aveiro.

The Arts House, (known as VIC) is the former home of a now deceased, renowned local artist Vacso Branco who made a prolific body of ceramic work and experimental films covertly under the Salazaar regime. The political films were shared with like minded intellectuals and dissenters in a clandestine cinema in the basement, which still functions for concerts and events today. The artist’s grandson, an electronic musician and DJ Hugo runs the space now, and I was informed that it remains an oasis of alternative thought in an otherwise culturally conventional small city.

Although most of my time was focused on work, I made trips to Porto and Lisbon and to the beach. One painting I made was of the fashion model for menswear brand La Paz. Founded by former marketing communications people, La Paz use a pal they’ve met, a local fisherman, for all their photoshoots, to stand out and give the company authentic credo. Having visited the beach in nearby Costa Nova and realised how particularly distinct the Atlantic coastline feels with a strong wind, I felt it would be cool to make a picture of this character on the beach and then approach the brand to exchange the picture for some apparel, which I duly did. My work is now is an international private collection of an established brand!

Photograph of work taken at the La Paz store, Lisbon.

Aveiro is not known for it’s arts scene, but there is, as I discovered, a large student population and consequently a strong experimental music scene there. It was interesting to attend a few concerts and this part of Portugal is well worth a visit. (I include below some further pictures). The calm of a small city was conducive to focusing on my practice and making a lot of work in a short timeframe.

Concert given by a Spanish duo at the University of Aveiro’s space.

Studio setup, The Arts House Aveiro (Known as Vic).

Install of work by curator Tiago Margaca.

A photo from a day trip I took to Porto to stock up on some much needed art materials. It’s a city with some good galleries.

From an exhibition by British artist Richie Culver at Nuno Centeno Gallery in Porto.

Also, I managed to visit the residency space Pada Studios in Barreiro during my trip to Lisbon where I had a good chat with its founder Tim.