Published by Dumbmutt publications, Bristol, 2025.
The author and illustrator hereby asserts their right to be identified as the creator of ‘Twelve Trees: In colour‘
Typeface is News706BT.
Background
The portraits
Biography
During the months of November 2020 and April 2021, while in lockdown , I decided to photograph trees as one would a portrait of a person: tying to capture the essence of that individual tree in the manner that Richard Avedon did while documenting the workers of America i.e. unencumbered by context so that the intricacies of form becomes the focus.
The twelve black and white tree photos formed the basis of a book published in 2022 just in time for my solo show of recent work in St. Michaels on the Mount, Without, a wonderful venue in Bristol.
Having lived with the photos for a while and having explored gel plate printing techniques for creating abstracts of flowers and AI to help create illustrations for a series of books on trees I realised that I could take the twelve photos a step further and using the originals create fully colourised and digitally colour separated and overlayed versions( as one would with screen printing) exploring the colours of Autumn .
These are the twelve works created during July and August 2025.
crataegus monogyna - hawthorn
3:Misty, with the sun trying to burn through.
fraxinus excelsior - ash
5: Low sunlight on a cloudy day
8: A very sunny day
10: Overcast yet clear
tilia cordata - small-leaved lime
11: In full sunlight.
12: In full sunlight.
fagus sylvatica f. purpurea –copper beech
Born in Germany to army parents, Ronnie initially studied under the Scottish colourist, John Nelson, at the newly opened Stevenson College in Edinburgh.
Living in garrison towns in both England and Germany, summers were spent in Berlin with his German family and while negotiating the impact of both a divided Germany and the Berlin wall, he developed a taste for modernism and an understanding of place; admiring the work of the architects Hans Scharoun and Mies van der Rohe as well as the art of Robert Motherwell and Franz Kline.
Moving to Dundee he studied at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design before graduating with degrees in Architecture from Dundee University.
Setting up the award winning architectural consultancy CODA Architects, he was able to explore themes that would also inform his Art; themes that were intellectually generated, poetically inspired and reflecting the ’genius Loci ‘ of a place.
Continued.
Dance #1: 2024.
One of a series of twelve backlit paintings
Ronnie now works full time from his Bristol based studio producing just twelve to fourteen paintings a year . He is also a photographer working in four main themes : Incident (the everyday stuff of life), Landscape, Architecture and Abstract images
Ronnie's work has been exhibited in Royal Scottish Academy and Royal West of England Academy and in 2019 exhibited a solo show in the Research studio in Arnolfini gallery in Bristol.
In 2020, he had two photographs exhibited in the Swindon Museum of Art and two paintings exhibited in the acclaimed 20 Contemporary Painters exhibition in Centrespace gallery, Bristol and held a virtual show in Averys wine vaults in Bristol.
In 2021 three paintings were shown at Creates Gallery in Monmouth as part of the Emerging Talent show .
Ronnie continues to show his work at solo shows every two years exploring themes relating to memory and a sense of place.
the original twelve trees of 2021
