BRUCE MORTIMER  .  ARTIST

Fine art, long since the the heart and soul of bricks and mortar galleries, deserve the same sense of presence in any online gallery.  This might be as difficult a task as it is to achieve presence, simplicity and relevance in a piece of art, or indeed in life itself.  With this challenge in mind, 4bstract attempts to encapsulate all of the adventure from the spark of inspiration somewhere deep in a remote landscape, to the presentation of fresh artworks for viewing pleasure, preserving originality and the artist's style.

With a thread of commonality, the 4bstract body of artwork spans expressionism, minimalism and simplicity all the way through to exquisite photorealism.  The use of differing mediums is a hallmark, and melding them together into dynamic and large scale mixed medium pieces is an inevitable progression.  And herein lies the relationship between art and adventure.  In exploring new ideas, the artist can break free of their own limitations, limitations which become  more evident the more we look critically at whether true creativity underpins the art we admire.

And to extend our minds in order to truly create, we extend ourselves in what might seem to be unrelated ways.  Creativity is, of course, not just the property of artists, but of anyone, anywhere, using their own selves to further a solution.  And so in ultimate terms, 4bstract is about innovation as much as it is about drawing and painting.  It is about journey as much as it is about pencils and paintbrushes.  It is about celebrating a crazy, inspired adventure that takes place well away from the artist's studio. 

For anyone who imagines that this artist wakes up in the morning, heads down to the studio and paints all day, this website is for them, as it hopefully serves to hint at  how the art is simply a manifestation of experience, a product not just of imagination but of training, as would an athlete.  We train our eye, our perception of the world, our relationship with landscape and the life that lies within it, and much later, we express ourselves in an intense session much as an athlete participates in a race.  Time away from the studio is not wasted nor a distraction, but quite the opposite.  Apart from it being the source of inspiration, it is a time during which the sub-conscious processes those experiences and imagines ways to better create art when given a fresh opportunity in front of the canvas.  It is similar to how when learning a language, taking a break from that learning makes us better at that language when we once again engage in study.  It is one of life's paradoxes.

Moving through the world, through our limited ability to see it for what it really is, through our own thoughts and emotions we hopefully reach a point where we know a little of who we are and what moves us in that moment.  Musicians, photographers, artists, creators, inventors all understand this point of being moved, and how that transcends any technical thought or proficiency, and results naturally in a work of art.