Alison Critchlow

I have two bodies of work in process at the moment, unfolding simultaneously and at different timescales. 

The Swarm series began in 2023 and grew out of a research project focused on the work of Romanian American artist Hedda Sterne. It uses an imagined swarm as a motif to explore collective impulses that transcend time and species – a reflection on individuals compelled to act as a form much larger than themselves.
The second series interrogates notions of landscape painting- taking the overview, expanding and reinventing it to delve into themes that reflect 21st century concerns.

I am fascinated by the language of paint and employ a range of marks as a type of vocabulary. Using thick impasto beside delicate dots and lines; the texture and heft of the material- messy and rough, refined or pure- is the syntax of my paintings. Slow, layered sections sit beside rapid gestures, making full use of the speed and weight of marks to create painterly sparks which communicate beyond words and screens. I’m very interested in the idea of the mind’s eye- memory, time, place, combining internal and external landscape, ‘time of mind’ and time measured in hours. 

I work on several pieces at once, often switching scale and pace, making little paintings on board alongside much larger, slower canvases. This practice of moving between paintings sets up an arena for watching instinct and thought at work. It is a way of exploring the interface between painting practice and conscious awareness. Sometimes the small works have a pulse and an energy which sums up the whole.

Biography
Alison Critchlow is a painter based in Cumbria, with a studio beside the Solway Firth. She trained at Falmouth School of Art, Cornwall and completed three years postgraduate study with Turps Art School. 
Alison has work in several collections and has exhibited widely throughout Britain notably at: Gallagher & Turner, Newcastle; The Art House, Wakefield; University of Cambridge; The Wordsworth Museum, Grasmere; Gracefield Arts Centre, Dumfries; Fairfield Mill; Brantwood; Open Eye Gallery, Edinburgh; Bianco Nero and Tullie House, Carlisle.

Alison has worked closely with the Wordsworth Trust on various projects in particular ‘Weather Words’ (2017) and ‘Poetry & Paint’(2018-24). In 2021 she was awarded an Arts Council England grant which funded a period of research and development focused on Romanian American artist Hedda Sterne. In 2022 she was the recipient of an Oppenheim John Downes Trust award and in 2024 she was shortlisted for the Contemporary British Painting Prize.