Midnight's Children

When Kenneth Webb bought an old cottage in Ballinaboy near Clifden, some twenty-five years ago, he intended to use it as a summerhouse only. He had not taken into consideration the fact that Connemara would weave its magic on him. His long walks into the blanket bog nearby opened his eyes to unexpected aspects of the landscape – the wonderful surface textures created by a profusion of natural forms of flora, the subtleties and nuances of colour enhanced by constantly changing light, abandoned and flooded bog workings, the reflection of cloud and skies.

The growing stimulus he received from the bog was paralleled by an interest in the wild garden that came with the cottage. This was an area of rock, bog and self-seeding wild flowers, "natives", which have since been kept and cultivated. These flowers have become an obsession – daisies, purple loosestrife, montbretia, irises, fuchsia and heather. Kenneth has built a pool which is full of waterlilies, and surrounded by miscellaneous plant forms on the water's edge. This rich tapestry is accentuated by extraordinary trunks and roots of bog oak, which provide fantastical shapes and forms.

The wild garden and the bog are the inspiration for this exhibition, which also marks the return of the poppy as a major preoccupation in Kenneth’s work. Some of these "poppy-scapes" have become very emotive and have evolved into an important series of Sheela-na-Gig paintings.

Kenneth Webb was born in London and grew up in Gloucestershire on the Welsh border. He lectured in the Belfast College of Art for some years before moving to Ballywater in County Down, where he founded the Irish School of Landscape Painting.

Please note that the images in this on-line catalogue were shot on location and thus some reflections can be seen from the glass of the paintings.