Art and Life
John McSweeney is a British artist whose work synthesises painting, print-making and digital photography. He explores social, political and historical themes using both figurative and abstract elements together with a strong sense of drawing and a bold use of colour. He has exhibited widely in the UK, and his work is collected both there and internationally.
Art
Paintings, Drawings, Collages, Prints and Digital Photography
John McSweeney is a British artist who trained at Camberwell College of Art. His portfolios (see below) contain examples of his work from the past four decades. These include paintings, drawings, collages, prints and digital images. Information about sales of his limited edition prints can be found here. His figurative work can also be found for sale at Singulart.
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His most recent painting, A Very English Summer, is made from 13 panels. Each panel represents one week, and thus the whole picture represents one season of the English summer as experienced by the artist.
Initially, he conceived the idea of making individual paintings, each containing a transfer print of a digital image. However he decided to consolidate all of these images into a single painting, hence the prints are fully or partly obscured by pigment.
He made these digital images from a number of photographs which he took during the summer of 2019. The main central figure and those depicted at the sides of the painting, were observed on a MAS sound truck at the Notting Hill Carnival. This event takes place every year close to the artist’s home. The two figures in the foreground were observed walking close to a beach on the South Coast. Other images were also derived from observations made in West London and the South Coast of England.
The painting highlights the richness and variety of modern England, but it also hints at the divisions which currently beset the country.
Although secular in nature, this painting reflects the artist’s long-held admiration for the many altarpieces displayed in London’s National Gallery.
His CV can be viewed here.
He can be contacted here.
He currently works at Banbury Studios in Acton, London.
Life etc
Essays
You can also find a portfolio of essays about art, life, and authoring crime fiction.
Odds & Ends
In the Odds & Ends section, you can find examples of photography together with a large archive of computer science articles from his time spent teaching for the Open University.
Portfolios
