Aidan Potts RI

Statement

I honed my watercolour skills over years as a professional illustrator for the national press, the speedy technique (using a hairdryer!) suited the tight deadlines. It became a medium I can’t be without. Especially its pellucidity which gives wonderful gradients and when layered, can imitate random, abstract textures.

At the moment I am working on a series of portraits of rogue flowers in man made environments.

Following William Blake’s exhortation in the “Auguries of Innocence”:

“To see a World in a Grain of Sand, And a Heaven in a Wild Flower.”

They are portraits of urban tenacity, indomitable nature, set against arid concrete, brick, tarmac and gritted paint.

Focusing on reduced scale, admiring life on a small stage and also trying to be alert to the random acts of kindness nature gives us, despite ourselves.

Every two pictures I work on alternate themes…often a portrait, sometimes city surrealism…like balled up aluminium foil placed in a hedge!

Bio

Aidan is an English artist based in London. Self taught as a painter with a degree in Art History from UCL, he has worked as a freelance cartoonist, illustrator, children’s book author, app & game developer. For the past six years he has concentrated exclusively on painting in water colours for exhibition and commissioning himself! 

Exhibitions

The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition

The Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours

The Royal Watercolour Society

The Royal Society of British Artists

The Sunday Times Watercolour Competition (2019 runner up)

Flux 

Gemini Art Prize

Hari Art Prize

Gallery at Green & Stone

TALP