AMANDA WIGGLESWORTH

I build up my paintings slowly over time, layer by layer. Using my long-established process, I apply a coat of oil paint then scrape passages away to create an interplay of dappled colours and then continue adding more paint mixed with resin building up an image. My ideas are to create an image based on chance. Physically, I use painting tools which limit my control of the medium. By using scrapers and household brushes, a random selection of marks emerge, including broad patches of colour. I then use a squeegee and wipe it across the image with a diluted oil mix. It creates distinctive variety of marks and broad patches of colour. I don't have a specific picture in mind when I start. I like the fact that it is not planned. The method of random choice and chance, its build-up and destruction produces an abstract image but never a pre-determined one.

Biography
Amanda Wigglesworth is a painter living and working in South Manchester, England. Her abstract expressive style is free-spirited and left to chance, it has no pre-determined outcome. She studied Fine Art combined with Art History at Manchester University, where she developed her distinctive mark making, using oil paints and resins to create highly textured layers and develop her expressionist techniques. Amanda has won two art prizes, in 2003, she won a prize at the Birmingham Royal and in 2015 she won Best Northern Artist at the The National Open Art Competition, ( NOA). Amanda Wigglesworth's paintings have been collected in America, South Africa and Western Europe. She had exhibited in London, Manchester , Zurich and Miami. Amanda has had two solo exhibitions in Manchester and has corporate collections at Dell Headquarters UK and also Govnet Communications, London. She is a member of the Society of Scottish Artists.

Amanda Wigglesworth’s work is based on paint as process; layers of oil paint, collage and textured pastes are painstakingly applied to the canvas over time. By taking paint off and reapplying, an image is built up and simultaneously disrupted as new layers are applied and removed. Primarily process driven, her work plays with the way paint runs, settles and layers, creating interactions between underlying forms and colours. The result is a harmony of colour and texture, revealing paintings of depth that although abstract, have definite forms, shapes and figures.

Amanda’s work is more aesthetic and sensual than conceptual, allowing subjective interpretation by the viewer. Universal forms, including the subliminal influences of landscape, natural form, architecture and personal memory are a key tenet. Through these, her work becomes self revelatory as the viewer finds meaning in the intoxicating blend of colour, texture and abstract figurative forms.

Amanda Wigglesworth is an award-winning British contemporary painter whose paintings are essentially forms and surface energies which are highly textured and rich in colour. The vigorous application and removal of paint form images of an inner landscape. She describes her style as bold, wherein, the heavy use of paint, colour, and texture are vital. In addition, Wigglesworth's striking abstractions are based on "paint as process" and chance. She primarily creates using oils and resin on canvas.

"For me, the atmosphere created gives the paintings their true value. Using bright colours and lots of textures, a vibrant image emerges.
I build up my paintings slowly over time, layer by layer. Using my long-established process, I apply a coat of oil paint then scrape passages away to create an interplay of dappled colours and then continue adding more paint mixed with resin building up an image.
My ideas are to create an image based on chance. Physically, I use painting tools which limit my control of the medium. By using scrappers and household brushes, a random selection of marks emerge, including broad patches of colour. I then use a squeegee and wipe is across the image with a diluted oil mix. It creates distinctive variety of marks and broad patches of colour.
I don’t have a specific picture in mind when I start. I like the fact that it is not planned. The method of random choice and chance, its build-up and destruction produces an abstract image but never a pre-determined one.
The process takes a long time and many different images appear on the canvas and it is only at the end, when the final image crystallises, that I am satisfied with the painting."

Amanda Wigglesworth

Education
Education BA(Hons) History of Art and Design with Practice Manchester UK

Events
ArtExpo, Miami, December 2019
ArtExpo, Zurich, August 2019
Manchester Art Fair , October 2018
Wilmslow Art Trail, November 2017
National Art Prize, (shortlisted) Oxo Tower, London, November 2017
Art&, York Racecourse, 30th October, 2017
Flux Art Exhibition, Chelsea College of Art, 12th-16th July, 2017
Artbox Project, Basel June 14th-19th 2017
Art Project, Miami, December 2016
Art Below Winter Exhibition, Truman Brewery October27th-30th,2016
Pallant House Prize-Winner Exhibition, Chichester, 2nd-13th December,2015
NOA, The National Open Art Winter Exhibition, 23rd Oct-2nd November, Royal College of Art.
Art off the Edge, Cheshire, 13th-15th November, Festival Hall, Alderley Edge.
The Other Art Fair, Bloomsbury 23rd-26th April, 2015
The Other Art Fair Truman Brewery Brick Lane 17th-20th October 2015
The Yard Alderley Edge Cheshire 22nd -24th November

Exhibitions
Group Exhibition, Hayhill Gallery, Baker Street London 13th-28th January 2015
East Cheshire Hospice Group Exhibition, Macclesfield, 2014
Art For Cure, Suffolk, May 2014
Wendy Levy Winter Exhibition, 2013

Solo Exhibitions
Portico Library , Manchester,2013
City Inn, Manchester,2008

Prizes
Northern Artist Award, NOA, October 2015
Birmingham Royal 2003

Competition
Ashurst Emerging Art Prize 2020
Post by amandajwigglesworth on January 4, 2020
"I have entered ​​​The Ashurst Emerging Artist Prize 2020 which is awarded to artists that show significant potential, interesting ideas, a relevant message and skilful execution.
They understand that talented artists exist in many forms, so endeavour to appeal to emerging artists of all ages and career paths, whether student, graduate, full-time or part-time, and from any country."

E-mail: info@hayhillgallery.com