Iain Faulkner Scottish, b. 1973
Scottish artist Iain Faulkner graduated from Glasgow School of Art in 1996 with a BA in Fine Art. He has had numerous solo shows in the UK, USA, France, Switzerland, Spain and Italy. His work appears in many private and corporate collections; in 2010 he was commissioned to paint the European Ryder Cup Team member portraits.
Iain Faulkner’s new suite of paintings explores the urban landscape of the contemporary city. Essentially topographic, these images delineate massed and multifarious assemblies of architectural form. Seen from afar, from an elevated viewpoint, his birds-eye views articulate the vast scope and scale of the meta-city, Los Angeles.
Faulkner is a master of aerial perspective. That is, his technique registers the effects of atmosphere and distance to emphasise the spatial depth of his subject. As forms recede into the background they are lighter, outline and detail blurs, contrasts reduce and there is a marked tonal shift to the blue end of the spectrum, although this is often mitigated by the throbbing pinks and yellows of sunset Californian skies. The painter captures the dusty haze and suffused light of the giant, sprawling metropolis.
In these forensic surveys of spatial and formal complexity, everything is in its place; all is subject to the rational scrutiny of the artist’s eye. The painter makes a painstaking assessment and reckoning of each pictorial element to form a coherent whole. He takes pleasure in the deployment of a plethora of multi-coloured geometric shapes that define the planes of buildings, occasionally interspersed with interstitial passages of trees and foliage, at odds with the unrelenting prescience of the built environment.
It is worth noting that the painter's viewpoint is from the Hollywood Hills, elevated and apart from the city. There are no people in sight, indeed the scale precludes seeing them. This subject is overwhelming, a behemoth, a machine for living, indifferent to its inhabitants and seemingly self-perpetuating. Seen from outside it is revealed as awesome - stretching to the horizon - a giant, faceted maze of possible outcomes and destinations, a modern-day Labyrinth, that, however, lacks a centre, but contains its own multitude of unique and unknowable risks and rewards.
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Hollywood Hills, 2026Oil on canvas30.5 x 30.5 cm
12 x 12 in -
LA, First Light, 2026Oil on canvas30.5 x 30.5 cm
12 x 12 in -
LA, First Light II, 2026Oil on canvas30.5 x 30.5 cm
12 x 12 in -
LA, Last Light, 2026Oil on canvas30.5 x 30.5 cm
12 x 12 in -
Manhattan Pier, First Light, 2026Oil on canvas40.6 x 40.6 cm
16 x 16 in -
Manhattan Pier, Sunrise, 2026Oil on canvas40.6 x 40.6 cm
16 x 16 in -
Ocean Avenue, 2026Oil on canvas50.8 x 50.8 cm
20 x 20 in -
Santa Monica Sunset, 2026Oil on canvas30.5 x 30.5 cm
12 x 12 in -
Santa Monica Sunset II, 2026Oil on canvas30.5 x 30.5 cm
12 x 12 in -
View from Mount Lee, 2026Oil on canvas30.5 x 30.5 cm
12 x 12 in -
View from Runyon Canyon, 2026Oil on canvas91.4 x 91.4 cm
36 x 36 in -
View from Runyon Canyon, First Light, 2026Oil on canvas76.2 x 76.2 cm
30 x 30 in -
View from Runyon Canyon, Setting Sun, 2026Oil on canvas76.2 x 76.2 cm
30 x 30 in -
Brooklyn Boardwalk, 2023Oil on canvas30.5 x 30.5 cm
12 x 12 in -
Manhattan Bridge, 2023Oil on canvas91.4 x 91.4 cm
36 x 36 in -
Morning Glow, London II, 2023Oil on canvas76.2 x 101.6 cm
30 x 40 in -
Pebble Beach Evening, 2023Oil on canvas30.5 x 30.5 cm
12 x 12 in -
The Message, 2023Oil on canvas40.6 x 40.6 cm
16 x 16 in
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Iain Faulkner
LA Light 6 Aug - 5 Sep 2026Faulkner is a master of aerial perspective. That is, his technique registers the effects of atmosphere and distance to emphasise the spatial depth of his subject. As forms recede into...Read more -
Above the Valley
A Group Exhibition 22 Jan - 7 Feb 2026This short-running January exhibition occupies the gallery as a temporary pocket of time - a contained space in the heart of London's Fitzrovia that opens outward onto something far larger. Across photography, painting and works on paper, the exhibition brings together artists whose practices circle the idea of landscape in its many registers: seen from afar or at close range, mapped across bodies and objects, or stretched into vast, expressive terrain.Read more -
Alone, Together: The Quiet Religion of Solitude
25 Oct - 21 Dec 2025Pontone Gallery is delighted to announce Alone, Together: The Quiet Religion of Solitude, a group exhibition featuring works by nine artists. The show is a provocation of what the self experiences when all is stripped away.Read more -
Liquid Resonance
Currents Through Portrait, Landscape & Abstraction 10 Jul - 2 Aug 2025Liquid Resonance brings together eight compelling approaches to the theme of liquidity, where water, oil, paint, atmosphere and memory are used to evoke transformation, emotion and reflection.Read more -
Iain Faulkner
A Man Alone... 20 Nov 2024 - 11 Jan 2025Pontone Gallery is proud to present a new suite of works by Scottish figurative painter, Iain Faulkner. These images feature his trademark, solitary, male figure set in dramatic and picturesque landscape - in this case Alpine Italy, specifically Lake Como and Lago di Braies. On the shore, looking out over the water, stands Faulkner’s protagonist, typically alone, brooding on a picturesque and sublime vista. In their staging such compositions make overt reference to romantic landscape painter, Casper David Friedrich’s iconic 1818 masterpiece ‘Wanderer above the Sea of Fog’. Faulkner’s contemporary iteration of an existential hero in contemplation of nature is implicit and points to a similarly romantic desire to re-establish this archetypal character and locate him in the present day.Read more
Faulkner’s technique is an accomplished and painstaking masterclass in pictorial representation where attention is equally given to all aspects of the scene. There are no areas that are vague, all that is seen is dealt with and fully articulated. This clarity of view is achieved by his rigorous control and analytical application of tonal and colour values. This, in turn, is allied to a formal and exacting draughtsmanship that defines an exhaustive structural framework that forms the bare bones of each carefully thought-out arrangement. The artist’s desire to make the real and the tangible drives his vision so that we are in no doubt about the nature of the picture he is painting and his intentions in doing so.
The man in the paintings is, of course, the artist. These are self-portraits, but somewhat humble and self-effacing, as we do not see his face. Always dressed in the same clothes – a snow-white shirt, black trousers and braces, stout shoes – Faulkner comes across as an ‘everyman’, certainly not ‘bohemian’ as many would depict themselves. We join him in his view of the world, he asks us to stand with him and look over his shoulder to see what he sees and to share his wonder. -
Pontone & Albemarle Group Show
4 - 26 Feb 2022Acclaimed Scottish painter, Iain Faulkner , continues his enquiry into the expressive potential of the solitary male figure. Whether located in a luxurious international hotel room or the rugged landscape...Read more -
The Albemarle Gallery
Opening Exhibition 15 Apr - 16 May 2021Northern Irish painter Kyle Barnes creates highly accomplished figurative portraits, capturing intimate moments that feel distinctly raw and undistilled. We encounter his subjects through a painterly lens that does not...Read more -
Iain Faulkner
A Solitary Man 15 Oct 2020 - 10 Jan 2021These are not melodramatic poses, but everyday and almost mundane. The subject is caught at a point of rest and contemplation. He gazes out across the land or city-scape, he...Read more -
Masters of Paint
Augusta, Georgia 1 - 21 Jun 2020Pontone Gallery presents a special exhibition in Augusta, Georgia. This is an exhibition of five painters, who explore and exploit process. Common to all is an obsessive interest in the materiality of paint and the technique of painting. Each presents the viewer with a rich and seductive surface. Each articulates their particular vision.Read more
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Manhattan Pier, First Light , 2026Limited edition print on Hahnemühle Fine Art Agave Paper40 x 40 cm£ 395.00
15.8 x 15.8 in -
Ocean Avenue, 2026Limited edition print on Hahnemühle Fine Art Agave Paper50 x 50 cm£ 495.00
19.7 x 19.7 in -
View from Mount Lee, 2026Limited edition print on Hahnemühle Fine Art Agave Paper30 x 30 cm£ 295.00
11.8 x 11.8 in -
Rendezvous, 2020Limited Edition Print on Canson Arches Aquarelle Rag Paper80 x 80 cm£ 600.00
31.5 x 31.5 in -
St Paul's Solitude, 2020Limited Edition Print on Canson Arches Aquarelle Rag Paper70 x 70 cm£ 525.00
27.6 x 27.6 in
