‘Close Up’ – David Gledhill

‘Close up’ brings together figurative paintings and pastel drawings by Manchester based artist David Gledhill for his first one person exhibition in the city.

Fascinated by the pre-modern tradition in art the from Titan to Manet, together with personal experience and intuition, Gledhill employs drawing, colour and composition to realise a sense of living human presence. Working freely from the imagination, situations are set against the spirit of the landscape and presented in all their ambiguity and mystery.

From the raw energy of early impasto paintings of isolated male figures bound by ropes to more recent subjects of love and love lost, Gledhill puts across the intensity of the sensations of being and feeling.

The more recent paintings are thinned down, the technique broader and softer and the imagery more relaxed, yet the effect remains dramatic and theatrical. Wild colour continues to trigger controlled explosions of emotion.