Artist Andrew Farmer Is Hailed As The ‘Yorkshire Impressionist’

Doncaster may not evoke the same romantic artistic connotations as Paris or Provence but the skills of local artist Andrew Farmer in capturing light and landscape have seen him acclaimed as ‘The Yorkshire Impressionist.’

Andrew, who says the Impressionists such as Monet and Cezanne are his ‘heroes and inspiration,’ was the youngest artist to become a Member of the Royal Institute of Oil Painters (ROI) when he was elected five years ago, aged just 33.

His latest exhibition, ‘Northern Impressions,’ features images of the Northumberland coast created from numerous visits over the last 18 months, often working ‘Plein Air’ – in the open air – and the more than two dozen works trace his transition from the use of brush to almost exclusively palette knife. It is, he says, a technique that allows greater exploration of light and texture in the finished work.

Andrew, who is married to paediatric nurse Sarah and father to Jacob, aged 10 and Eden, 8, has painted since leaving university but only turned full-time professional 10 years ago and has been garnering a growing national and international reputation ever since. In December last year he was awarded the prestigious ‘Le Clerc Fowle’ medal for an outstanding group of paintings at the ROI’s London exhibition at the Mall Galleries.

I love painting the ordinary, analysing simple, everyday subjects to encourage the viewer to look more closely at the many wonderful and beautiful things that surround us daily but which aren’t always fully appreciated.

I regard myself as enormously privileged to do what I do and, in reality, I am just inspired by the infinite fascination of life. Andrew Farmer

Andrew’s work tackles a broad range of subjects, including highly personal family scenes, still life, portraiture as well as rural and urban landscapes. His work is held in private collections across the globe and he has won numerous awards.

When painting ‘plein air’ he will spend no more than 60-90 minutes at a time capturing a certain light in the landscape and return to the same spot over several days to complete the scene in the same weather conditions, a technique practiced by Monet.

I feel dissatisfied with creating a painting in a single session so multiple visits enable me to really dig deeper into the subject so that I really ‘see’ it and not just ‘look’ at it. I work almost exclusively from life and find that nature offers endless inspiration with the seasons having real impact on my work.

I am very flattered at any comparison to the Impressionists, of course, but right at that moment our worlds did seem very far apart, Andrew Farmer

Of course, modern artists can have the kind of problems that didn’t trouble their predecessors.

On the way home from a painting trip/ family holiday on the Northumberland coast creating works for the exhibition, the car broke down requiring the attention of three breakdown trucks and turning a 2.5-hour journey into an 11-hour marathon.

Liz Hawkes, owner of Watermark Gallery, said:

“Andrew is one of our most popular artists with a previous show called ‘North Landing’ and based on the Cleveland Way being one of the best-selling exhibitions we have ever had. I have no doubt at all that this lone will be every bit as successful.”


The ‘Northern Impressions’ exhibition at Watermark Gallery, Harrogate runs from 7 – 22 June and Andrew Farmer will be present and at the gallery on Saturday, June 8 between 11am to 3pm
For further information please contact Liz Hawkes on 01423 562659/ email – info@watermarkgallery.co.uk