MARTYN BREWSTER, PARKWOOD SERIES 17, 1991
We had planned a show in our New York gallery next month of the paintings of British artist Martyn Brewster. This would have been his first exhibition in USA, following our sale earlier this year of 4 paintings by him at art fairs in Palm Beach. This exhibition will now take place in the autumn and will feature works from the 1980s to 2019. His paintings in my opinion are extremely affordable, with this work being offered at $24,000.
Here we highlight one of my favourites from the show, ‘Parkwood Series 17’ from 1991. The name ‘Parkwood’ was the name of the road of Brewster’s new studio in Dorset, having moved from north London the year before, where he was at Park Studios. He told me today that he likes the personal connections of the word, and the evocative aspects of ‘Park’ and ‘Wood’. While there are no landscape references in this work, the majority of his abstract paintings are actually strongly linked to the English landscape tradition.
I also particularly like the very heavy impasto particularly noticeable in the blocks of colour lower right. This is a bold and commanding painting, and I would be proud to own it myself.
Brewster studied under Dennis Creffield (whose estate we represent) and his early work was influenced by the main Abstract Expressionists, Europeans such as Nicolas de Staël and Serge Poliakoff and certain British artists such as John Hoyland . He has had retrospective exhibitions at the Russell–Cotes Art Gallery and Museum, 1997; the Royal West of England Academy, 2001; and the Study Gallery of Modern Art, Poole, 2003, amongst others. He has won numerous awards and has work in private, public and corporate collections worldwide. Public collections include the Victoria & Albert Museum, British Museum, Russell–Cotes Art Gallery and Museum, Arts Institute at Bournemouth and Bournemouth University.
MARTYN BREWSTER British (b. 1952)
Parkwood Series 17, 1991
Oil on canvas
72 ¼ x 60 ¼ in / 183 x 153 cm
Signed, titled & dated on reverse