Saul Cathcart

I usually need to be somewhere close to the power and energy of the sea. Big waves and rough weather excite me. Somewhere with an edge to it and an instant presence. Like the battered old slate cliffs at Strangles near Bude, where sea takes no prisoners.

Or the ancient and industrial coastline around Porthtowan and Chapel Porth, where the waves barrel up again and again.
Here there are lots of hidden places and different angles to explore.

I love escaping up a well trodden track to a windy cliff top or wandering down to paint on rocks at the edge of a raging tide.
Each painting is unique to its day and location. The sun, the light, the rain all play their part.

I try to enable each piece to keep a certain accuracy, so that land marks can be instantly recognised. But I also want to say something about the mood and energy of a particular place, along with my own thoughts and feelings, through abstract, instinctual and spontaneous mark making.

All of my passion, experiences and knowledge of the Cornish Coast go into each piece. From surfing the perfect wave and noticing the glowing yellow sunlight bouncing all around you, to walking the rugged cliff path home through an ancient windswept landscape, with the roar of sea in the distance.

Saul Cathcart  2011

Saul Cathcart spent his childhood in St Clether near Launceston. Having completed his Foundation studies at University College Falmouth, he pursued a BA Fine Arts – Sculpture degree at Winchester. Upon his return to Cornwall he took up painting again, reasoning that he was dealing with the same issues of light and space and has developed his unique visual language, painting en plein air.

He recently visited Sounthern Ireland to paint scenes along the length of the southern coast before holding a very successful exhibition in The Grain Store at Ballymaloe House, Cork.

 

Light eats its way though the clouds,
above porthtowan, 75x80cm, mixed media on canvas

Shadows, wind and swell 2, at the mouth of porthtowan,
march 2011, 13x13.5cm, mixed media on card

Shadows, wind and swell 4, at the mouth of porthtowan,
march 2011, 13x13.5cm, mixed media on card