Paul Duval, "The Art of Graham Fowler", The Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, 1985.

Excerpt form catalogue...

Graham Fowler: Artist's Statement

The paintings in this exhibition are derived from nature and produced from photographs in a studio environment.

Nature provides the motif in my painting, photography the means. Photography acts as a contemporary sketchbook, a data collector that provides information. Rather than replicate Kodac, I use the photographic properties of freezing time, simplified tonal relationships and a verifiable image as a springboard to something else.

It is not my intention to solely describe the visible surface of things. Rather, I choose to heighten the visual rhythms and patterns of a specific scene. Form, line, colour and tonal contrast are altered to enhance the significant meaning of the image.

Though the properties of painting provide the language of my art, it is only one element of the content. The act of painting the external world involves one in an active identification with the subject. Observation of landscape reveals life as a vital process. Cycles of growth, birth, decay and metamorphosis constitute an experience of life influx. It is the relation between life (ie: nature) and the vocabulary of painting that form the thesis of this exhibition.

Graham Fowler