Iain Faulkner: A Man Alone...

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.

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.

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