Peter Turnbull: Featured Artist

30 March - 24 April 2024

This Easter, Whitewater Contemporary present work by landscape painter Peter Turnbull.Peter studied at Nottingham College of Art and the Royal College of Art in both London and Paris. Following on from his exhibition at Whitewater in 2022, this collection continues his relationship with the landscape of North Cornwall, and seeks to explore the physical act of painting, whilst unearthing the defining elements of the Cornish landscape.

Cliffs, boulders, a distant copse of trees, and the line where sea meets land are painted in translucent light as day gives way to night, demonstrating the artist’s understanding of English oil painting in both the historical and contemporary sense. Taking the material, scale and location of his subjects as a starting point, Peter allows his work to evolve on the canvas in a way that exploits chance, automatism and the physical qualities of his oil paints. In this way his work transcends its reference points, revealing new perspectives on the artist’s sense of place.

Peter Turnbull received the Rodney Burn Award for Figurative Drawing, was Head of Fine Art at the University of Chester, and later became Visiting Professor of Fine Art after embarking on his full-time career as a painter. He exhibits widely in solo and group exhibitions in America, Europe and the UK, and his paintings are held in both private and public collections.