Parsons Cove, Cornwall
By Hayden Price
Original painting
Oil on canvas board
Image size: H: 70cm x W: 43cm
Framed size: H: 92cm x W: 66cm
This extraordinary work depicts a famous but secluded cove on the South East coast of Cornwall, just off the coastal path and owned by the National Trust. It's one of the artist's favourite painting destinations and we are showing other work painted, plein air, very nearby.
Hayden turned full-time professional artist this year and, as testament to that decision, this is an astonishing feat of photo-realist-style beachscape painting - except, however, that it's not just painted from a photograph: Hayden visits these places and sketches and paints in situ, before completing each work in the studio, based on his drawings, artworks and photographs. In this case, he made two visits to the cove, first to sketch, then to paint.
Nor does he try to simulate a photograph in full - he wants you to see those tiny brush marks when you get up close - some of them made by brushes of a single strand that he makes himself.
This bravura piece is many months of work, rendering each surface - each sparkling water undulation, each reflection and rock face, each section of background grassy bank - and giving us the illusion of perspective, as if we could walk to the bank edge and peer over the top into the water.
Typical of this artist, there is daring and confidence, both in the perspective and in the confidence of an artist willing to take on such a challenge - and pull it off so successfully. It's also beautifully framed by Emma Clarke.
This painting had its first showing at The Mall Galleries in London this year, as part of the Royal Society of Marine Artists annual exhibition, where it was highly acclaimed. The RSMA is the focal point for much of Britain's finest contemporary marine art and many of the country's leading marine artists are elected Members of the Society.
Works of this quality hold something new and exciting for the viewer on every look - and one can never tire of looking.
ABOUT HAYDEN PRICE
Hayden has lived in Gloucestershire for most of his life and it's the region he painted most - until he mved to Cornwall last year where he has turned professional and now loves to paint coastal scenes in the region.
The seasons, with their changing light and colours, are his inspiration and his oil work is a detailed reproduction of the atmosphere, light and depth, sometimes to photo-realistic levels.
He has an astonishing ability to render natural textures, field crops, waves and rocks and other landscape or beachscape features.
Works like this are painted over many months and require brushes of sometimes a single strand.
Hayden has twice been accepted into the Bath Society of Artists exhibition, in the second year winning the public's favourite painting. Self-taught, he has been painting since he was 15.