Howard Morgan - Watercolours

Howard Morgan has enjoyed a dominating position in British figurative painting and studio portraiture for the last thirty years. His dramatic bravura style has brought a large society following and frequent royal patronage. He has been commissioned to paint HM The Queen, HM The Queen Mother, and HM The Queen of the Netherlands and his work hangs permanently in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery. Alongside his portrait practice Howard has developed into many different genres: landscape painting; religious pictures; murals; and most notably his conversation pieces. The latter are mainly large scale, often wryly witty and almost exclusively racy in subject. In each Howard manages to create a tension, bringing the viewer to a moment at the climax of some aristocratic debauchery or other.

In watercolour Howard is a different artist. Away from the high drama of his thickly applied oil paint his watercolour brushes show a gentler more contemplative soul. In this exhibition his inspiration is largely drawn from the countryside and its changing seasons around his house in Herefordshire. Although the work demonstrates the same surety of hand of his oils, the light touch and subtlety of tone display a sensitivity and evident peace and enjoyment in his surroundings.