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Paul Lemmon
Degree: BA Graphic Design
University: Kingston University
Graduation Year: 1993
Voyeuristic, fixated and fetishist, Lemmon’s work is also exciting, provocative, atmospheric and compelling, in the way it inhabits an unstable, detached, partial and intrusive modern gaze. Like a Toulouse-Lautrec turned sinister.
“I am a self-taught painter who studied graphic design and worked as a designer before committing to painting full-time. I work He works from my own photography acquired whilst soaking up the culture and colour of city life, and I consider this to be an integral part of my practice. Once the images and compositions have been established, I work with the oil paint very rapidly in order to preserve and intensify the spontaneity inherent in the original image – seeking to heighten the energy and emotion of the captured moment through vigorous brushwork, vivid colour and strong contrast. My work is characterised by sharp, unorthodox angles and ruthless cropping which result in paintings that are laced with a seductive cinematic urgency.
My subject matter and approach are inspired by the work of photographer William Eggleston with his ‘snap-shot aesthetic’, and by nineteenth century French writer Charles Baudelaire and his descriptions of excursions through the Parisian bars and streets of his time. This approach leaves a distinctively voyeuristic impression on my work, reflecting contemporary obsessions with the hidden camera and fly-on-the-wall observation. Also, by omitting the specifics of environment and identity through the heavy crop and graphic composition, I aim to engage the viewer in an even more intimate but open-ended way. What interests me most is conveying atmosphere and mood rather than individual people or locations. I want the viewer to feel immersed in my paintings, to feel a sense of physical presence and to be left to imagine their own characters and narratives in what they’re seeing.”
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Selected Solo Exhibitions
2008, Works, 9 Langton Street Gallery, Chelsea
2008, Works, Esprit de Vie, Kent
2007, Works, Apollo Galleries, Kent
2006, Solo show, Red Gallery, Thame
Selected Group Exhibitions
2008, Group show, Floren Fine Art, Poole
2008, Works, Lacy Road Gallery, London
2006 Affordable Art Fair, Battersea, Red Gallery