Fiona Robinson

Name:

Fiona Robinson

Role:

Artist

Media:

Drawing

Region:

South West England

A line drawn on hot-press paper, rubbed until it fades and fuses with the surface. The bleeding of charcoal trapped and paled by layers of paint. These processes produce marks of exquisite tension and great spatial depth. I make abstract interpretations of movement across terrain and through interior spaces. My work is an enquiry into process, memory and repetition.

What defines drawing: intention, format, support? Works in sketchbooks tend to be seen as drawings because they are investigative; primary sources; studies for something else; therefore apparently unfinished, ephemeral, work in progress. They are part of a journey towards another state of being.

I am interested in the point at which painting and drawing meet. Canvas suggests painting. The 'Journey Sequence Paintings and Circular Walk Drawings' made between 2005 - 2009 address the issue of the nature of drawing and consider the moment when a drawing stops being about drawing and starts being about painting.

During two residencies in Ireland in 2010 I worked extensively in sketchbooks. In Co. Mayo my house faced the sea, nothing between me and Greenland, and every morning I drew the rapidly changing horizon, the light, the weather, and the mountains appearing and disappearing like ghosts. At The Cill Rialaig Project in Kerry there was nothing between the rugged coastline and America apart from the Skelligs, two outcrops of rock inhabited in the fourth century by a group of monks. For them, their location was the edge of the known world. I went out to the Skelligs in wild March seas in a ferociously bronco-bucking, little fishing boat and once there, climbed to the top. Two of the scariest things I have ever done! These experiences translated themselves self into a body of work concerned with Unstable Horizons.

Horizons Sketchbook 1 has been selected for the Sketch National Drawing Prize Exhibition at Rabley Drawing Centre in Marlborough 2 April - 25 May 2011.
Unstable Horizons paintings will be exhibited in A Field Guide to Getting Lost at the Pelavin Gallery New York City in May through July 2011.
CV
Prizes and Awards
2011 Excellence in Drawing Prize Royal West of England Academy Open Exhibition, Bristol
2010
Fellowship, Ballinglen Arts Foundation, Co. Mayo, Rep. of Ireland
2007
Third Prize. 4th International Biennial of Drawing Melbourne 2007, Australia.
Winner of the University of Bath Painting Prize, 2007.
Winner of the Proof Magazine Writing competition
2006
Brabcombe Award, Ale and Porter Arts. Highly Commended.
2004
The Indigo Arts Prize, Liverpool. Finalist.
Recent One Person Exhibitions
2008
The Study Gallery of Modern Art, Poole. The Circular Walk Drawings
Lighthouse Centre for the Arts, Poole. The Journey Sequence, 2007
2007 and 2001
New Greenham Arts. Greenham
2000
Havant Arts Centre, Portsmouth.
1998 and 1995
Selected Recent Group Exhibitions
2010
Dorchester Arts Open 2010 Exhibition
Kelly Ross at The Art Stable, Child Okeford
Affordable Art Fair, Battersea with Murphy Machin Art
Anonymous Drawings N°10 Berlin
2009
Royal West of England Academy 157th Autumn Exhibition, Bristol
The Northern Art Fair Harrogate with Murphy Machin Art
fringe mk Painting Competition Finalist
Drawn In, Open exhibition at Sidcot Arts Centre Devon
Affordable Art Fair London with Murphy Machin Art
Lineweight Truman State University Art Gallery Missouri, USA
Drawing Room II. Royal West of England Academy of Art. Bristol
Illusions of Space. The Brewhouse, Taunton, with George Meyrick and Penny Elfick
Transition. Exeter Artspace, Rougemont Castle, Exeter.
The Bargehouse, Oxo Tower Wharf, London.
2008
Edgar Modern, Bath
Invited Artist. Kosovo International Drawing Biennale, Kosova Art Gallery, Prishtina. (Catalogue)
Trig Point. The Study Gallery of Modern Art Poole
Dorchester Art Centre Open ‘08
Drawing Matters. Bristol Drawing School, Bristol
Bettles Gallery, Ringwood, Hampshire
2007/08
Bournemouth University Art Loan Collection, 2007/8
2007
4th International Drawing Biennale Melbourne, 2007. Melbourne, Australia. (Catalogue)
Benalla Regional Gallery, Victoria, Australia.
Steps Gallery, Melbourne, Australia
University of Bath Painting Prize Exhibition, Bath.
Royal West of England Academy 155th Autumn Exhibition, Bristol (Catalogue)
Rowley Gallery, London
2006
Vth International Biennial of Drawing Pilsen 2006. Czech Republic. (Catalogue)
Trace Gallery, Dorset
Ale and Porter Open Exhibition, Bradford Upon Avon.
Bettles Gallery, Ringwood, Hampshire
Royal West of England Academy 154th Autumn Exhibition, Bristol (Catalogue)
2005
Sketch 2005. National Contemporary Drawing Open. (Touring) Rabley Drawing Centre, Marlborough
Seven Seven Gallery, London.
‘Environmental’, Stroud House Gallery, Stroud
Royal West of England Academy 153rd Autumn Exhibition, Bristol (Catalogue)
Millfield Open, Atkinson Gallery, Somerset.
Black Swan Arts Open Competition, Frome
Morgan Boyce Gallery, Marlborough
Salt Gallery, Hayle, St Ives
Education
1997
MA Fine Art. University of Portsmouth.
1989
BA Hons. Fine Art and History of Art. Oxford Brooks University, Oxford.