Profiles of Artists exhibiting at The Beauly Gallery

Profile of Gabrielle Reith

Gabrielle Reith was born and brought up in the Aberdeen area. She studied Fine Art (Drawing and Painting) at Gray’s School of Art, graduating with an honours degree in 1998. Since graduating with a sell out degree show she has exhibited in many prestigious venues throughout Britain and has worked on commissions for both corporate and private clients.

She has recently completed a commission of ten large canvases for the Bonham Hotel in Edinburgh. She is looking forward to a busy year in 2005 with several exhibitions lined up and is also working on commission work for some private clients. She has just had three images of her work published by Scottish card company Tartan2cv that will have worldwide distribution. Gabrielle was recently featured in the Scotsman newspaper as being one of the top 20 artists in Scotland.

Her artistic perception gives her a heightened awareness of her surroundings and she is always looking for new patterns and colours in the landscape. Her work is a portrayal of nature, a closer look at the shapes, colours, patterns and seasonal changes that affect a landscape. Originating from landscapes seen, drawn and photographed in her home in Scotland and also when visiting countries such as Australia, Spain, Italy, France, Portugal and Austria, her paintings reflect the architecture, archaeology and natural features of these landscapes.

Gabrielle builds up a natural and animated effect, using layers of collage to represent the textures whilst abstracting and reducing the shapes and then building up the surface with colour applied in paint and oil pastel. She then scrapes back the surface to reveal hidden layers of paint and collage, as an archaeologist would uncover past layers of earth and architecture. Gabrielle is inspired by the landscape in all aspects of her work, including drawings, paintings and pieces constructed in textiles. She also finds inspiration in the colours and shapes of much of the 50’s, 60’s and 70’s art and design, collecting china from that period. Her initial drawings look closely at patterns and shapes and are linear in approach. These are followed by watercolour / acrylic studies, collage and oil pastel studies where the abstraction of content becomes apparent. She hones in on basic shapes amplifying the aesthetics of balance weight and geometric harmony.

Her work looks at the richness, purity and harmony of colours and the interactions between them. The colours bring about immediate feeling rather then intellectual response, yet the depth of the layers and the abstract yet recognisable forms make you look that bit deeper. Gabrielle Reith is one of the most successful young artists currently showing in Scotland, talented, committed and innovative. An exciting artist.