Carl Randall Girl in a Grid, 2024

 

'Canal' and 'Girl in a Grid' are depictions of contemporary London, combining common motifs in my work - people and places. 'Canal' is a composite of waterways in the city. By arranging the design into horizontal bands and by repeating shapes and colours, flat patterns are emphasised. To create an ambiguous toy-town feeling (where the canal could either be real or be a table-top scale model), I intentionally played with scale and space - the people in the crowds are large, whilst people on the boats are miniaturised. The crowds are in monochrome and
everything else is brightly coloured, adding to a sense of abstraction and unreality. 'Girl in a Grid', by contrast, is intended to be more naturalistic in its use of colour and space, with traditional linear perspective being used to create depth. On a narrative-level, the perspectival lines are intended to evoke a chess or game-board, or of
the figure being trapped within a framework - associating the girl with certain psychological states. The clinical, pristine environment is based on some new-build developments in London. In both paintings, I have used the motif of the profile portrait - I enjoy the formality this can create within a design, and is in a long art historical tradition.

 

Carl Randall is a graduate of The Slade School of Fine Art (BA Honours Fine Art Painting), the Royal Drawing School (the Drawing Year), and Tokyo University of Fine Arts, Japan (MFA and Doctorate in Painting). He
has exhibited several times at the National Portrait Gallery's Portrait Award (2024, 2013, 2012, 2002), and was their Travel Award winner in 2012, displaying a series of Japan-themed paintings. He has also exhibited numerous times at The Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition (2019, 2013, 2009 2012) and The Royal Society of Portrait Painters Exhibition at the Mall Galleries (2024, 2020, 2018, 2017, 2012). Carl has also had solo exhibitions in London and Japan, and has taken part in Art Fairs in Switzerland, Japan, London, Turkey and Taiwan. His work is
in the collections of The Royal Collection, University College London Art Museum, Tokyo Geidai Art Museum Japan, and Foundation Carmignac Paris; and has been featured on the BBC World Service and CNN. Carl is
also the winner of The Sunday Times Watercolour Competition and The Nomura Art Prize Japan, as well as several other awards.