Tom Calnan

............................................................ ............................................................ ............................... I am an artist who lives and works in Milton Keynes. I was born in East London and then moved to Cornwall where I grew up and went to art school. I studied for a degree in fine art painting at Bretton Hall and graduated in 2000 (Hello to all the old Bretton folk out there). I really love just being out and doing things. I use to freedive and do a bit of mountain biking which helped influence my early paintings. I have been working as an artist in residence, and am soon to be running some workshops and giving talks at the OU. ............................................................ ............................................................ ............................... I build abstract structures on canvas in a 2D space. I want the pictures to look complex while yet being minimal. I paint straight out of my mind without drawing or planning the end result. I love the dynamic of action painting, contrasted against the hand painted shapes. No stencils and no projections are used as I think this would go against the nature of the process’s I work in. I love the colours being so intense that they melt straight into your retina. ............................................................ ............................................................ ............................... A lot of modern paintings use none of the classical techniques that developed over hundreds of years of refinement and practice, to disregard these skills seems absurd so my studio time is always varying and dynamic. Understanding the different pigments and chemicals also lends to the science of my art. ............................................................ ............................................................ ............................... Another aspect of my recent work has been classical figure painting and a way for me to engage the classical and modern techniques in one pictorial space. I understand the paradox in what I said about my work being non-representational, but to merge the two feels like a struggle I have with coming to terms with what painting means today. I constantly develop and refine my ideas through my studio practice. ............................................................ ............................................................ ................................ ............................................................ ............................................................ ................................ ............................................................ ............................................................ ................................ ............................................................ ............................................................ ................................ ............................................................ ............................................................ ................................ ............................................................ ............................................................ ............................... You should create your own MySpace Layouts like me by using nUCLEArcENTURy .COM's MySpace Profile Editor !