Zachary Walsh
Forza del Destino, oil and mixed media on canvas, 122 x 152 cm.
Kings, oil and mixed media on canvas, 180 x 140 cm.
Aphrodite, oil and mixed media on canvas, 152 x 109 cm.
Eurynome The Creation Of Myth, oil and mixed media on canvas, 132 x 168 cm
Fidelio, oil and mixed media on canvas, 122 x 152 cm.
Pallease et Mellesande, oil and mixed media on canvas, 122 x 152 cm.
La Boheme, oil and collage o canvas, 170 x 110 cm.
Liam, oil and mixed media, 86 x 66 cm
About The Artist
Walsh, a graduate of London’s esteemed Royal College of Art, has been touted for some time throughout the art press as one of the leading lights of Britain’s contemporary underground art scene. He draws upon a range of classical influences to imbue his subjects with a rich allegory and symbolism, creating pristine representational figures within striking, abstract compositions of space and geometrical blocks of colour – drawing comparisons to Lucian Freud, among others. Leon Billing of the famous London Art Blog has described Walsh’s recent work as ‘beguiling’ and ‘beautiful’, with ‘a masterful feel for portraiture, expressions, gestures, poise and pose of the human physiology’. It is this eye for expressive composition that has gained Brighton’s Geisha Arts – of which he is the founder, Creative Director and curator – its progressive and unique reputation. Geisha Arts has played host to works by a wide variety of celebrated artists, including Matt Small, Jamie Reid, Goldie, Rob Sample and many more – all brought together by Walsh’s vision of a place to interact, appreciate and discuss art beyond the rarefied confines of an alienating gallery system.
At its heart, Walsh’s art celebrates the traditional values of the representational, yet is infused throughout with a thoroughly contemporary sensibility. It is this tension, between the archaic and the modern, the real and the imagined, that imbues his paintings with their uncommon, ethereal mystery. Typical of his classically informed work are his series of pieces inspired by working with the Holland Park Opera. Using as models members of his friends and family, Walsh creates an intertextual space where the grandeur and opulence of the dramatic form collides with the familiarity of the everyday, helping us to see the conflict of the personal at the heart of the theatrical tableaux.
Leave a Reply