Lawrence Coulson Atmospheres

Several years ago, I discovered Lawrence Coulson’s art at the Akrona Gallery back in Akron, OH, where we lived. He is a UK artist who has painted professionally since the 1990s. I forget which print I first noticed at the gallery, but the one we eventually purchased was “Fen Sunlight,” a painting of a brown landscape with sunlight and encroaching storm clouds.

It seems like British classical music and now British art connects me to American midwestern landscapes of my childhood, because of the strong pastoral element. The reason I loved that print of fen country was the distant farm (or perhaps a tiny village). I reminded me so much of travel along interstates and two-lane highways, and I'd notice towns or farm buildings far off on the horizon, to me a very comforting and homey sight. For some reason, Haubstadt, Indiana, when viewed from the distance of I-64, was a favorite rural sign, but especially my mother's hometown, Brownstown, Illinois, from I-70. "Fen Sunlight," though a different kind of scene in another country, gives me a wonderful sense of peace.

Coulson’s paintings are of clouds, thick and gray; sky and clouds colored with sunrise or sunset or near darkness; land (whether fields or beaches), or water (lakes or seas) which meet the sky, but almost always with the sky dominating. There might be tiny figures discernible on a beach, or a faraway boat on the water, or buildings against the horizon. Some paintings have no discernible human presence. I would love to own a print of “Fading Light,” a sunset scene with a faint steeple, but it's out of print. I also love (but don't yet own) some of his lake paintings.

The book “Lawrence Coulson, Atmospheres” from 2004 (published by Washington Green) reproduces many of his paintings. Interestingly, his 1990s paintings show greater detail of things like grass and fields and trees, and his style has developed to deemphasize details in favor of contrasting colors. In the introduction he writes, “Some of the more recent works are indeed semi-abstract sky studies, no foreground or figures to speak of” (p. 10). He is glad that admirers and collectors put themselves into those landscapes. “I think that this is great; that is what it is all about” (p 11). That was certainly the case with me and “Fen Sunlight,” where I thought of myself, alone and driving, as I noticed a town or large farm several miles away and wondered what life there was like.

You can google Coulson to see some of his work, and also check the sites http://www.libertygallery.com/contents/en-uk/d64_lawrence_coulson_art.html and also
http://www.gregoryeditions.com/coulson.htm  The book “Atmospheres” features poems with the paintings, like this Gerard Manley Hopkins verse beside “Fen Sunlight.”

Strike, churl; hurl, cheerless
wind, then; heltering hail
May’s beauty massacre and
wisped wild clouds grow
Out on the giant air.