Ian White will be joining us in the Wilson Gallery with a thought provoking new body of work. In “Moonlight Sonata 1940” Iain combines research, reflection, and a painterly touch to produce evergreen depictions of the senseless destruction of war, and the community that rose in the ashes.
The series began with a discovery: A collection of photographs and newspapers from the 1940’s found in his mother’s house. This instigated a period of reflection on loss and resilience, both of the Coventry Blitz and of the artist’s childhood growing up in its aftermath. Iain has twined this emotional strand with scholarly research to create a series centred on “Moonlight Sonata” the German code name for the Luftwaffe strike on Coventry in November 1940.
Using a restricted palette to suit the gravity of his subject matter, Iain sensitively portrays the destruction and loss of the Coventry Blitz and the stoicism of the people who faced it and rebuilt. A blend of representation and abstraction contrasts solid grounded figures with impressionistic wavering wreckage. This is carried out in a manner and style reminiscent of war artists such as John Piper, Graham Sutherland, and Henry Moore, while also being entirely Iain’s own. Brushstroke building on brushstroke to craft images of conflict and recovery that are at once personal and universal.