Bonfire, Angel of the South 24"x24"
implied, a shadow of a figure. It gives you an incredible feeling that something is about to happen.’ It takes visual intelligence and a light touch to capture that exciting sense of expectancy. Fred is surrounded by paintings at different stages of development. Ideas from one painting can pollinate another. Sometimes he starts three paintings of the same subject and takes them all in different directions. Some he will shelve and come back to, possibly years later. Some he will wipe off and start again. Eventually he finds something he really likes. ‘Learning to look is what it is all about,’ he says. ‘Then an awful lot of trial and error makes you a little bit
cleverer about what you can say. Mastery of technique is essential - but only as a vocabulary.’ Although he still loves to paint and draw outside, now he says he works ‘hugely from memory’, looking at old sketches and earlier work. ‘The same things turn me on,’ he says, ‘but I’m more adventurous now. I struggle to keep an open mind.’ After Eighties: recent paintings by Fred Cuming RA, Robin Rae and Alfred Stockham RWA with pottery by Richard Batterham is at Sladers Yard from 17th November to 20th January 2019. Please contact the gallery for more information. sladersyard.co.uk bridporttimes.co.uk | 23