“I live and work as an artist in a rural part of Ireland with my wife and two children. My family and the structure of our home has always been a source for my work. They are a vehicle I use to save me from floating off into space. Themes and concepts arise to me in the act of painting, not before it.”
Brian Harte
“I conveniently forget how any painting starts. If I start a white canvas with a strong concept or idea, it inevitably fails. Painting for me isn’t illustration. Heavily conceptual beginnings usually don’t stand up to the pressures of actually making something with a substance that is messy at heart.”
Brian Harte
“I try to create a network of things to engage in. It draws people into the picture plane and then it can go anywhere, which is what I enjoy most about looking at paintings. There are no cul de sacs in the work, there is always a way forward, a place for the eye to move. Cohesive meaning is not what I’m after, more a cohesive mood or a sound from the image.”
Brian Harte
“I work solidly in the studio in the morning and sometimes mid morning I’ll do some gardening in between painting. I work until 5 pm every day and if there are shows or deadlines approaching I’ll work late into the evenings. I relish it and have made the studio a place I want to go to, at all times.”
Brian Harte
“A lot of colours my work are derived from Ireland and the geographical setting. I live in the midlands of Ireland, it’s like a Dutch landscape essentially. Field and sky meeting as far as the eye can see.”
Brian Harte
