Claire Cansick

Claire Cansick was born in Great Yarmouth 1971. She graduated from Norwich Institute of Art & Design in 1996 and lives and works in a village by the Norfolk Broads. Cansick has recently exhibited at Firstsite, the Royal Academy of Arts, Norwich Castle Museum, and the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Art. Her work is in private collections worldwide.

Cansick’s paintings and drawings map a journey through the landscape, wherein a deep concern for the natural world is coupled with a reverie in solitude. Her work is inspired by nature and classical fiction, drawing comparisons between past and present representations of human nature. She is particularly drawn to the sea and its offer of escape, taking palette cues directly from Iris Murdoch’s The Sea, The Sea, she cites: “Near to the horizon, it is a luxurious purple spotted with regular lines of emerald green. On the horizon, it is indigo.”

Cansick begins with photos taken from the water as source material, before discarding them to let meditative brushwork dictate the facets and folds of the waves. Holding the horizon high serves as a compositional tactic to immerse the viewer in the water with her; the eye is instinctively drawn to the horizon, where industrial ships appear to drift silently, almost merging with the sky.