For as long as I can remember, the planet on which we live has been a source of wonder and fascination to me. I harbour a deep love for wild, rugged scenery and a fascination for the extreme effects of light and shade which often play on it with great result.
I gained my Masters Degree (distinction) from UWTSD* in 2019 but began my painting career in 1992, after completing an HND in Illustration and a short spell as Designer for Plymouth City Museum & Art Gallery.
From my first encounter with the towering mountains of Snowdonia in North Wales, I developed an intense desire to discover more about how such a jagged, mountainous landscape had been created - to look beneath the surface of the scenery I could see and really begin to understand the natural processes such as glaciation, which had been instrumental in its shaping tens of thousands of years ago.
I have subsequently spent the last 25 years exploring and painting mountains and glaciers around the world beginning with Norway’s Jotunheimen National Park. Excursions to paint the European Alps and expeditions to west Greenland, Antarctica and Iceland followed. These have provided a wealth of unforgettable experiences, from first hand encounters with truly spectacular icebound subject matter to undertaking the many challenges of painting on location in such hostile environments.
In spite of this fascination with our frozen world, my attentions do return to the Gower coastline on my doorstep. It is a stunning area full of striking sea cliffs, rocks and sandy bays and is somewhere I regularly explore on foot. The wealth of ice age geology I am beginning to discover provides much inspiration for creativity, from the structural to the hidden and the vast array of beautiful greys which exist due to fast-changing, often squally weather.
My love for snow, rock and ice has taken me far beyond where I ever expected to go and it will undoubtedly continue to do so. I am inspired by both the ordinary and the extraordinary, close to home or half way round the world and I enjoy immensely undertaking the many challenges that handling this extraordinary subject matter involves. Working en plein-air in the Polar regions is something I never could have envisaged when I first took up my paintbrush some twenty something years ago!
Rowan Huntley MA, Associate Member of the Alpine Club.
Please visit rowanhuntley.co.uk to delve into the contemporary elements of my evolving creative practice…
*MA Fine Art - Contemporary Dialogues, University of Wales Trinity Saint David, Swansea School of Art.
