Garry Harper Artist CV
Right now we are waiting for new Garry Harper Art to arrive at the gallery. In the meantime, below is a selection of the artist's archived art work which has featured at Red Rag Art Gallery. If you wish to register to receive updates and alerts when new art work from Garry Harper arrives let us know in the red box.
Garry Harper was born in Scotland in 1966. He graduated from Glasgow Art School in 1984 and chose to go down the path of design first - as a graphic designer for TV. Although he enjoyed working in the Read more
land of the moving image, designing title sequence and idents for Scottish Television, his real love he discovered was back with what he’d always been doing, drawing and painting.
The two main subject areas Garry Harper works in are figure painting and landscapes. In his own words “People and their lives fascinate me, especially lives that were lived years ago. The figures are inspired from various sources - I love memories and glimpses of the past. Images that capture imagination and make you wonder as to who or where. The spark could come from a sitter modelling for me or drawings from sketchbooks or found photographs. I try to instil in my work more than just an image - an attempt to play on the viewer’s imagination and give them the first steps of a story. As I paint a figure, more often than not it takes on a life by itself and I find myself engrossed in a new character and delight in seeing a face or head or body come to life from the paint daubs or splodged brush strokes coming from my hand. The sense of satisfaction is immense when I sit back and take in who’s just appeared in front of me!”
Garry Harper’s other love, landscapes, play an important part in his work too. The paintings are a mixture of sketches and images taken whilst travelling, then worked up in his studio. Like many, he says, he has an affinity with the sea and loves finding little remote spots to try and capture in painting or drawing. He’s also drawn to boats that he finds on his journeys, old boats in particular as they too have a life and a story to tell. He’s also working up to painting outside ‘plein air’ “as I think this will take the work I’ve already done into a new and exciting direction”.
As well as showing in Red Rag Gallery, Garry Harper has exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh (RSA), various London affordable art fair and other galleries around the country. His work is growing in demand as he becomes more known.
