Vanessa Gardiner

We are pleased to hold stock of Vanessa Gardiner’s work which can be viewed by appointment. Please do call to arrange to view her paintings. Vanessa lives close by and it may also be possible to retrieve pictures not currently in stock at Sladers Yard.

Vanessa Gardiner’s most recent solo exhibition here was Coastlines from 23 April to 19 June 2016. A fully illustrated 28pp catalogue of that exhibition is available at £8 plus £1.20 p&p within the UK.

Godrevy Point 12 2017 acrylic on board 60 x 30 cm

Dorset-based artist Vanessa Gardiner returns to the dramatic slate-black coastline of Boscastle in North Cornwall as inspiration for many of the paintings in her latest major solo show. Vanessa Gardiner has a growing following of collectors of every level. She has been working as a professional artist for many years, always pushing her distinctive style further and deeper. This was her third solo show at Sladers Yard.

Since her first visit as a child with her parents, Gardiner has returned to Boscastle almost every year to walk, draw and paint the much-loved cliffs surrounding the harbour and the restless turquoise sea beyond. Her father used to read her the wonderful Moments of Vision poems that Thomas Hardy wrote remembering meeting his first wife there.

Beeny Cliff 9 2014 acrylic on plywood 26 x 66 cm

Vanessa Gardiner paints in a dynamic geometric style enlivened further with lyrical curving lines of hills and pathways. In some paintings, acid grass greens sing alongside the marvellously moody blue-grey cliffs and crisp white surf. In others, soft greys or greens are scoured and scored, washed back and reapplied, to give surfaces like those of a pebble on the beach. Seductive in colour, texture and composition, these paintings are deepened and intensified by memory. They explore what is known and felt when experiencing the raw beauty of the place. Gardiner’s discipline always to stay true to the landscape as it is keeps her work fresh and vital as a sharp sea breeze.

Vanessa Gardiner was born in 1960 in Oxford where her father was a tutor of philosophy at Magdalen College. She did her Foundation year at Oxford Polytechnic going on to study Fine Art at the Central School of Art and Design in London. At first she had to work in offices to earn her living and paint in every spare moment but in 1991 she had her first solo show with Duncan Campbell Gallery in London and has been able to concentrate on her painting fulltime ever since. In 2001 she joined the Hart Gallery and had six major solo shows there. She had her first solo show at the Thackeray Gallery, London, in 2015. In 2008 she had her first solo show at Sladers Yard which very nearly sold out. A second very successful show in 2012 focused on the Greek shoreline.

Her work is in private collections around the world and in public collections including Exeter Hospital, Bournemouth University Collection, Carlow Collection Ireland, the Archive of the Ballinglen Arts Foundation Co. Mayo, Cowley Manor, Huddersfield Art Gallery, Fidelity International, New Hall Cambridge, Magdalen College Oxford, British Academy London and the British School at Athens. She lives in Charmouth, Dorset, with the painter Alex Lowery and their daughter Jessie.

The paintings by Vanessa Gardiner which we hold in stock are shown below. To enlarge them and view them with captions and prices please do CLICK ON ONE OF THE IMAGES and scroll through the slide show. If you would like to enquire or to buy one of the paintings please call Sladers Yard on 01308 459511 or email gallery@sladersyard.co.uk.