Timothy Gatenby

Timothy Gatenby is a contemporary British figurative artist who nostalgically paints modern imagery such as motorways and pop culture with a traditional Old Master approach. Through his limited palette and a ghostly distortion of imagery a sense of foreboding lurks behind the softly executed painting surface in Timothy’s world. His work has been displayed at the National Portrait Gallery, Royal Academy of Art, Mall galleries and Birmingham Society of Artists.

 

Gatenby’s paintings feature nostalgic characters from 90s television, rendered with a painterly quality more associated with the esteem of Fine Art than the amusement of light entertainment. Familiar characters, usually known for being brightly colored and fun, are depicted in washed-out hues; their smooth cartoon-like surfaces represented as textured and greyed. The usually jovial characters of popular television are stripped of their bright, happy personalities and on them, something much more sinister is superimposed.