June Berry NEAC

Statement

June Berry finds her subject matter in her every day surroundings, either in a tiny hamlet in deepest rural France where she spends some months of the year, or in the streets and parks of South east London where she lives. The small events in people’s daily lives, often glimpsed in passing - the elderly dog walker with an equally elderly dog, the tree surgeon performing his ballet in the topmost branches, the French village housewife busy in her front garden full of vegetables - provide moments of amusement, sympathy, amazement or simply delight which translates into oil paintings, watercolours and drawings.

Methodology

All June Berry’s paintings are made in the studio, where she is not distracted by reality. She finds it easier to select from information drawings made on the spot, photography, memory and experience and to include elements not there in reality. She is equally concerned with the abstract pattern that emerges as she paints, the  blurring of vegetation into half seen patterns for example and the possibility of allowing the painting to take on a life of its own when new colour and compositional possibilities appear along the way.

She works in oil on board, which allows the possibility of cropping, using only sable or nylon brushes and rags.

Bio

1924  Born in Melbourne, Derbyshire

1942-43 and 1946-49 Studied at the Slade School UCL

1943-46  War service in the WRNS, decoding in Newport Pagnell, an out-station of Bletchley Park

1950-85  Part time teaching in various London Art schools, including the Sir John Cass, Wimbledon School of Art and Croydon College of Art

1973  Established a studio in west central France

1986  Elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Printmakers

1990  Elected Member of the New English Art Club (NEAC)

1993  Elected Member of the Royal West of England Academy (RWA)

1993  Elected Member of the Royal Watercolour Society (RWS)

2001-04  Vice President of the Royal Watercolour Society