Artist
Malcolm Ashman
Born in Bath, Somerset in 1957.
Malcolm is a painter working in oils, acrylic and pencil, the landscape and the figure are the principal subjects.
He is an academician at the Royal West of England Academy (RWA), a member of the Royal Society of British Artists (RBA) and the Royal Institute of Oil Painters (ROI) at the Mall Galleries, London. He has exhibited widely in London and the south of England, including the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition and the Threadneedle Prize.
“Two subjects have engaged me over many years, the landscape and the figure. I don’t maintain a single cohesive style but prefer to allow each piece to dictate how I will respond.
The landscape paintings, at one time directly observed, are now worked from brief drawings and memory. Now the process has become as important as the subject matter. As a child the landscape was a place of escape, I was often alone but here I could draw, paint or just observe and imagine. An early lesson in the joys of solitude that’s stuck with me.
I’m working with the figure more and more and it’s a totally different proposition. I want it to be an interactive process and I enjoy the unnerving prospect of not being in complete control. My impulse is to observe closely, recording as accurately as possible my response to the sitter and their response to me. Both paintings and drawings are built of layers and repeated marks over a long period, the resulting work a hybrid of both myself and my model, a record of time spent.”