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Sharon Bruster
Sharon Bruster’s paintings capture the joy of observation, the colourful stillness and beauty of rockpools.
Sharon lives and works in St Mawgan on the North coast and this is her sole inspiration, most specifically the water’s edge and the spaces between high and low tide. Walking, photographing, gathering, writing haiku, sketching, collage, and painting are all part of Sharon’s daily practice. In creating a series of paintings, exploration is key – with each series of work she investigates new ways to express her fascination with this landscape.
Rich surfaces, colourful coastal palettes and expressive mark-making draw the viewer closer and evoke memories of favourite coastal places. Shapes, colours and textures observed at the meeting of land and sea are constant motifs in her work.
Painting Water
Sharon starts the paintings laid out as one large ‘jigsaw’ on a painting table – this means she can get some big marks laid down by working right across the full combined surface. Then, she adds layers of acrylic inks, sprays them with water to move and combine with the pigment on the surface, then the paintings are wiped with cloths to reveal the texture and reveal a variety of marks and tones.
“As the surfaces built up, I gradually reached a point where I could separate the pieces and start to work on them as individuals – editing with more ink and then areas of flatter acrylic paint to contrast with the fluid, inky, watery marks. This contrast of the ‘solid’ and ‘fluid’ interests me about rockpools – the different textures, shapes and colours visible in these contrasts.”
Our Favourite Pieces
Each piece is beautifully handmade and unique, we have selected a few of our favourites to show you.
Rockpool Paintings
This body of work is based on Sharon Bruster’s fascination with coastal pools, rockpools and saltwater gathering and leaving traces at the meeting of land and sea. Each series has its own character – the same sources of inspiration, but made using different media and processes. Each series is an exploration. Each develops the story, like different chapters of the same book.
Paintings Inspired By A Pocket Full of Shells
A series of paintings inspired by mussel shells collected on beach walks – the incredible colour palette, the texture, the shape. When out walking, Sharon always has a pocketful of shells…do you?
