Gillian Ayres

Hinba

Ayres was influenced by American Abstract Expressionism and her early work involved pouring and squirting paint directly onto the canvas and using rags and brushes to move it around. Hinba is a departure from this style, notable for its thickly encrusted oil paint, painstakingly built up over a long period. Its huge scale and complex structure may be difficult to contemplate but can reward those who let their eyes and imagination play across its surface.

Ayres usually titles her paintings once they are finished. Hinba is the name of an unidentified Scottish island which was the location of a ancient monastery. However, Ayres's abstract paintings are not intended to represent particular places, as she puts it: "Through colour can be created a vision of human scale and sense of experience of place".

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