Jenny Purrett

Jenny Purrett gained her MA in Fine Art at Bath University in 2008 and relocated to the North East after completing a year-long artist in residence post with VARC (Visual Arts in Rural Communities) at Highgreen, Tarset. Using a variety of materials and processes, she responds to the landscape in which she lives by making work which often takes an experimental approach to drawing. Alongside her own art practice, Jenny is a part-time art teacher at QEHS, runs regular drawing sessions at Newcastle Arts Centre and The Hearth at Horsley, and has been involved in various community projects which aim to facilitate others in discovering their own drawing potential. She exhibits her work throughout the UK and, in recent years, has been artist in residence at both Sunderland and Northumbria Universities and at Berwick Visual Arts.

Drawing is a process of discovery. I love to look and re-look, investigating and observing over and over, always noticing something new each time. These are overlaid drawings which are built up by looking at the same tulip again and again, recording not only the process of looking, but the subtle changes in the flower as it wilts or moves. In these particular studies, I have sprayed the paper in between each drawing. I love the unpredictability of this process: how water allows the drawing materials to have a life of their own and the contrast it creates with the initial clear-cut line drawings.