Dawn Dance
Exhibition: 21 August - 07 September
12:00-18:00 Wednesday - Saturday
Dawn Dance grew up in the rugged South West peninsular of Cornwall. She trained at Falmouth School of Art, which she followed up with a Fashion and Textiles degree at Kingston upon Thames.
Dawn has taught a wide range of art and design based courses in Further and Secondary education alongside running her own businesses as a decorative artist, antiques restorer and gilder. Dawn returned to her childhood home of Cornwall in 2016 and in 2019 gave up teaching to concentrate on painting the landscape she knows so well.
Her paintings focus on the rugged landscape of South West Cornwall and in particular the powerful atmosphere of the West Penwith area of her childhood. She finds the ancient granite geology shaped by the elements and wild open skies are addictive and loves the man interrupts nature, small farm buildings clinging to rocky cliffs, lanes cutting deep through gorse and bracken, ancient granite hedgerows creating pattern and interest.
Dawn works in a range of mediums using both photography and drawings as a starting point. She often draws straight onto a board and incorporates her initial drawing marks by layerIng drawing mediums into her paintings.
She also uses acrylics combined with drawing as the medium to allow her to work fast and create textures. When she I wants a slower drying time to move the paint around and create rich depth of colour, she uses oil paint, often using a palette knife to vary marks and add vitality.