Chris Neale

I moved with my family to Wales from Devon in 1966 and have lived in Pembrokeshire since 1997. I attended school in Penarth and then studied Graphics in Bristol. After a career in Graphic Design I returned to painting some time ago, a passion I have had since I was very young. I have an intense relationship with my subject and see the landscape with a graphic eye, focusing on composition and colour. My paintings are an attempt to convey the emotions I feel and to share them. I spend a lot of time exploring, seeking out compositions and emotionally-charged landscapes in which I aim to assemble the components which have created my emotional response and then discard the rest. My compositions must have something out of the ordinary to them, a sense of drama, colour or some other deep emotional quality. I am fond of flowing curves, influenced by the excitement of following tracks and the anticipation of what lies around the corner. With a love of reading maps, this leads to seeking out locations far from the mainstream. Some locations in Wales have a magnetism that draws me back time after time. There is a Welsh word that expresses this better than any English equivalent - hiraeth. Chris Neale Website