Mason, Gail
Gail Mason completed her MA in Multi-Disciplinary Printmaking at UWE in 1994, with a sell out show of large-scale screen monoprints. She now bases herself at Spike Print Studio producing work for galleries, corporate businesses, educational establishments, hospitals, theatre commissions, and exhibition. She has been awarded National Printmaking Prizes from RWA Bristol and ‘Originals’ Mall Galleries London (2008) and her work is held in private and public collections worldwide.
The uplifting and reflective abstract silkscreen monoprints are worked on a generous scale, which enables the use of gestural painterly marks, together with fine detail. She explores the emotional landscapes of the soul, where rich sumptuous colour contains multi-layered imagery.
The prints are built up from successive layers of painting, stencil and scraffito, improvising using dissonance and harmony around a given theme. The ‘taste’ of colour is fundamental to her practice and sets the mood for the paintings.
The secretive nature and ‘semi-blind’ process of painting through a screen forces her to internalise the formal elements, allowing her to utilise the chance mark without being inhibited by the ‘white space’.
Inspiration usually comes from the idea of journeys, be they literal or metaphorical, recent landscape based work explores solid colour and uses a more literal approach. Research in aerial photography, the psychology of colour and Aboriginal ideas of mapping the land continue to inform her work.