Angie Wright is an established artist from the UK, living in Portugal, whose paintings have been featured in both solo and group shows internationally. Practicing art ever since she was a child, Wright creates expressionist style botanical works and portraits in acrylic and oil on canvas. She is inspired by nature and aims to represent a neglected beauty in her work through vivid color palettes and energetic mark-making techniques. Today, Angie is selling her art online exclusively with SINGULART. We sat down with her to talk about her current projects, inspiration, and the start of her artistic career.
When did you know you wanted to be an artist?
I was always going to be an artist of one sort or another. Music or dancing, or even the creation of new recipes. Anything where I could push outside the box and do things my way. I like to challenge myself and in paint I found the perfect companion. Oh, how paint moves! Gloriously glossy and thick like syrup. I can push and shape paint, sculpt it into textured layers, paint is my accomplice! I dream of colours and landscapes, then sit plotting with my paints on how to bring my visions to life. The paints became my passion and through them I knew I was an artist.
Can you talk about your artistic influences and other artists you are most inspired by?
I am strongly influenced by the world around me and the colours I see. Nature doesn’t often dilute its colours and I therefore work with a bold colour palette. Strong cerulean blues and primary yellow, intense magenta and pink, I find these colours create an energy in my art which reflects the constant change and chaos of nature. The colours used by Vincent Van Gogh in his later paintings breathe life into me! Through the strength of those colours his paintings jar my memories and take me back to childhood summer days. Another artist I love is Leroy Neiman who also worked with strong abstract colours in relation to his subject, bringing a dynamic energy to his paintings.
Do you prefer to work alone or collaborate with others?
Alone – I get lost in the painting, it feels meditative. Quite often I start a painting in a random chaotic manner and then plan and create from that point. The painting will often direct me in the direction of the finished artwork, rather than beginning with a vision of how I want the painting to look. If I am working with a client on a commissioned piece, we discuss the floral elements of the painting and how those flowers can represent specific memories or ideas to them. I can then build their concept into the painting, which can be challenging and exhilarating as well.
Can you tell us about a project you are currently working on?
It is the summer in southern Portugal where I live and the landscape is dry and arid but only recently there was an abundance of flowers on the surrounding hillsides. My current project aims to represent the fleeting beauty of nature and how a moment in time becomes a fractured image or memory which flickers on the edge of your mind. By using broken expressionist dripped line and stiff brush strokes of oil paint I want to create a series of paintings which represent the shattered memory of a moment in time.
What do you think you would be doing if you weren’t an artist?
I can spend hours walking around thrift stores and French Depot Vente’s looking at old furniture. I love taking vintage items and turning them into something unique and contemporary. There is a challenge in it and an excitement that something once beautiful can be reborn whilst the history lives on. Restoring furniture would definitely feed the creative urge within me!
Have you found any other artists on SINGULART whose work you admire?
I love the natural organic shapes and textures in the reliefs and sculptures of Giulia Madonia and the striking pixelated portraits of ALO.
What advice could you give to young artists who are just starting out?
Experiment! You can never develop an individual style without first figuring out what makes you tick. Allow yourself to make mistakes but never throw them away! Some of the biggest turning points in my artistic style have happened when a painting went wrong! I love the thrill of taking an uninspiring, paint splattered canvas and finding the route forward with it. It pushes me to try new ideas and techniques and this is when something magical can happen.
