Fred Sorrell: Long Tide

Parafin is delighted to announce its first exhibition with the young British artist Fred Sorrell. This will be Sorrell’s first major solo exhibition and will focus on new work, including his largest paintings to date.

Sorrell’s paintings have their basis in the act of looking. His work is predicated on a rigorous and extended study of light, colour, space and form in nature. Sorrell says ‘When studying colour in nature and watching how it splits, bounces, reflects and absorbs, I ask myself, “How much am I not seeing?”’

Beginning with colour studies and notes made in the landscape Sorrell then works in the studio to distill his perceptions into abstract compositions. He develops pictorial structures that maximise the dynamic interplay of colour and which dramatise the relationship of motif and ground. His paintings are not presentations but rather, using subtle shifts and transitions of tone and colour, Sorrell seeks to create a viewing experience analogous to that experienced before nature. His abstract images are therefore not merely an objective record but an emotional response that also reflects the fluid dynamism of the experience of looking.

While his paintings encapsulate a highly personal, temporal perception of space, their titles take the viewer back to the point of inspiration. Titles such as ‘Field’, ‘Dusk’ or ‘Late Summer’ reference a location or season, thus tracing aspects of Sorrell’s inspiration. For Sorrell it is important that his work is connected to the natural world and not seen in isolation. However, as Sorrell says, ‘the paintings can be read on different levels. The colours and forms begin to build on my sense of the connectedness of space through light.’ Through this process, he says, ‘all the parts of the painting take on their own meaning and can act independently’.

A limited edition book ‘Long Tide’ has been published by the artist to accompany the exhibition.

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Fred Sorrell (born London, 1984) studied at Falmouth College University (2004-8). His most recent solo exhibition was ‘Between Sea and Sky’, Saturation Point, London (2019). He has participated in numerous group exhibitions including at Kristin Hjellegjerde Gallery, London, Royal Standard, Liverpool, and Cob Gallery, London. He has undertaken residencies at The Florence Trust, London (2012-13), Takt, Berlin (2009) and Kerel de Grote Hogeschool, Antwerp (2008). He lives and works in London.