Lesley-Ann Rose Eaton describes her new paintings, inspired by Cornwall’s Prussia Cove, as ‘sumptuous, like sweet treats. They are snapshots of a sunnier world, to be stepped into when reality feels too stark’.
Inspired by the season of colour, her paintings are a radiant take on the coast as spring turns to summer, when the ocean is turquoise and sea-pinks bloom along the cliffs. ‘My paintings are led by colour and I have a particular penchant for pink,’ she explains. ‘It is romantic and soft and always appears in my paintings. Perhaps there is a childhood innocence to that, but if you have ever spent time at Prussia Cove in early summer and watched the fields change to pure pink and gold, you will know that it is perfectly realistic.’
Lesley-Ann’s appreciation of the Cornish landscape, and the joyfulness of her artworks, stem from an understanding of the light and dark of real life. ‘I was born in Northern Ireland and grew up by the sea,’ she shares.
‘I have many happy memories of my childhood on the coast, of swimming in the ocean and camping in the dunes but being born in 1971 I experienced a very dark time in the history of Northern Ireland. People called it ‘The Troubles’, but it was a civil war. I grew up thinking it was normal to have soldiers on the streets of Belfast.’
Like many of her friends, Lesley-Ann left Northern Ireland to study at an English university, ‘though I wasn’t encouraged to study art’, she adds. ‘It wasn’t seen as academic enough, even though it was my favourite subject.’ She studied economics and social history before becoming a secondary school teacher. ‘But I was always sitting with the art teachers,’ she says, and at the age of 30 she applied to study at Falmouth College of Art. ‘That’s what brought me to Cornwall, and whilst studying I became aware of the strength of the art community here, particularly in West Penwith.’
She started work as a school art assistant in Sennen and was later appointed as the education officer at Newlyn Art Gallery. While there she met artist and tutor Jessie Leroy Smith, and applied to study under his guidance at Newlyn School of Art.
‘I was awarded a Cultivator grant to support my studies on the school’s Studio Practice course and then the year-long Professional Mentoring course. The Studio Practice classes began to alter the way I was working, because they were so experimental. It was disconcerting, at first, to let go of the representational way I had been painting, but by the time I embarked on Professional Mentoring I was already painting landscapes in a semi-abstracted way, because my work had gone through some major shifts in perspective.’
The first artist she studied with was landscape painter Amanda Hoskin. ‘She really inspired me,’ says Lesley-Ann. ‘She is such a generous teacher.’ She was also tutored by artist Rachel Reeves, saying: ‘I feel privileged to have learned so much from her.’
Lesley-Ann cites many Cornwall-based artists as influential to her work, right back to painters of the late 19th century Newlyn School, including Dame Laura Knight.
‘My Irish heritage also plays a major role in my painting. There are many crossovers between Cornwall and Ireland’s two landscapes and their artists.’
Lesley-Ann begins her paintings en plein air out in the landscape. ‘I listen to sounds and observe details around me whilst sketching, and I will return many times to make notes about the landscape and the light. Back in the studio, my sketches merge with poems and songs in my mind until I find a particular feeling, and a particular colour palette, and am transported to another world.’ She describes that moment as ‘a shift in perception, like a magical realism’ where fact and the wonder of fiction combine.
Prussia Cove holds meaning for Lesley-Ann as a place she first visited, for swimming, whilst at art college. ‘It’s a magical place and holds so many memories for me, of friends, parties and weddings,’ she shares.
‘Even its name conjures up ideas of romance. Like the piratical tales of The King of Prussia, it is rich in folklore, and the landscape is full of wonder and mystery. I have swum in its sea, bathed in its light, walked the coves at dusk and watched the changing of the sky. Prussia Cove holds a special nostalgia for me, as it must for many others.
‘I think of it as a liminal place of dreams and fairytales and hope I have captured some of that magic in my paintings.’.
lesleyannroseeaton.com
