Kate Barton

About Kate Barton

Cultural Science (Blue) [1998]
Oil on canvas, 183 x 153 cms
Donated by her widower Stephen Barton 1999

Julia Ball has written of this work: "The colour, the ultimate surface of the painting, is a soft luminous blue-grey moving between warm and cool tones, influenced by the earlier layers. Floating on this ground are groups of cell-like clusters of a darker hue, dispersed to form circular shapes by the impact of turps and varnish on oil-paint. Kate described her method of working as 'a process of dropping white spirit into oil paint, heavily diluted with damar varnish to give works that both look and are chemical' ... The contrast between the clusters and the detail of their textures with the limitless field on which they float give a dynamism to the painting. But they also, through their placing, would seem to be moving in and out of the painting, which expresses the aim of achieving 'feelings of impermanence and instability'."

Donated by her widower Stephen Barton in 1999, following an exhibition of Kate Barton's works, held in her memory in New Hall, in 1999.