“There is a meditative quality to Helen’s work, both in the way she works and the feeling you get as the viewer, looking inwards through layers of paint and pigment which tell a story of the parts of the world around us that often go unseen, yet are familiar in our subconscious memory”. Rhiannon Cottam, The Summerhouse Gallery
Paintings imbuing a liminal quality, rooted in memories, emotion and connection
“When I take a moment to observe something, like a wave or a budding rose, it opens and expands my awareness, leaving me with a sense of presence and gratitude”.
Helen Leaver's practice uses pentimento and palimpsest to explore the transience of time and memory. Her intuitively-led process unfolds through cycles of construction and destruction, moving between the conscious and unconscious, embracing and harnessing serendipity.
Helen says, “I returned to painting later in life- after some serious life events, and I'm finding that my art practice is entwined with meditation and poetry, sometimes using lines from poems as starting points. I'm gently discovering that the act of painting helps me to develop a deeper understanding of the many layers to my sensory experience and to process and express my emotions.
I am acutely sensitive to the unassuming and subtleties of form, patterns and colour in my environment.
Painting from the sanctuary of my garden studio, I put aside initial observational drawings and allow the final image to reveal itself by patiently applying and editing the many veils of oil paint, feeling the connection with the part of me that has no beginning or end”.
As visual meditations, Helen’s paintings offer the viewer a polite invitation to slow down, pause and reflect on their own emotions, or ponder on a fond memory.
BIO
West Country born, now based in mid Cornwall, Helen embarked on the intensive year-long St. Ives School of Painting ‘Porthmeor Programme 2023’ and has exhibited and sold work in solo and group exhibitions in St. Ives, Falmouth, Newquay and Truro. Her work is now in private collections throughout the UK, USA, Germany, Austria and New Zealand.
Helen is represented by The Summerhouse Gallery, Marazion, Cornwall.
