Nice Paintings 

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Anthony Morton’s paintings are the result of experimental,

unpredictable and sometimes hard won negotiations with his work.

Striving for a genuine, unpretentious practice devoid of preconceived

outcomes, Morton surrenders to the painting process, allowing it to

determine the destination of his work. His diverse range of layering

and re-working of the canvas results in highly tactile and seductive

surfaces that record exploration and immediacy: paint is plastered,

seeped, washed and brushed on until the painting is finished.

Ultimately he attempts to create visually arresting paintings; exploring,

challenging and testing the threshold of what can be seen.

 

Morton draws inspiration from art history, the natural world and

film, as well as the music of Moondog, which is often heard echoing

down the stairs to his studio. Morton introduces and repeats imagery

appropriated and abstracted from these various sources.

 

The horizon is a recurring element in Morton’s work. Horizons

appear over the ocean and behind veils. Morton writes, “Horizons are

the point where what can and cannot be seen meet. The decision to

use the beach as a source of reference imagery came as a way to

start painting, using a subject both predictable and accessible to be

surprised by. Later I became fascinated with how it read as equally

cliché as it was romantic, appearing as ideological as painting itself. It

seemed to me to be the most accessible subject, which offered me the

space to be as experimental as I wanted within it, with the possibility

that anything could happen. I wanted to bring the avant-garde to the

fore, rather than it being the by-product of trying to do something else. I

was inspired by how strange and taboo this was to grapple with, which

seemed in line with my inclination to attempt to make radical paintings.”

 

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