Bernard Jacobson Gallery presents The Golden Striker – Esk Paintings; a special exhibition of new paintings staged in celebration of William Tillyer’s 80th birthday. The Golden Striker of the exhibition title is an extraordinary, nine metre long painting, creating an immersive, panoramic experience of light and saturated colour across the entire back wall of the main gallery space. Complex, sophisticated and heroic, this sublime work exists on many levels but is first a homage to the colour gold and the elemental role it plays in paintings of importance to Tillyer.

Painted directly on to 5 free hanging panels of industrial plastic mesh, The Golden Striker is a challenge to the formal constraints of the flat picture plane and an open invitation to the viewer to interact and move with it – as Tillyer did whilst painting. The paint is applied from behind the picture plane and through the mesh grid as well as from in front, the paint is woven into the painting, which allows us to encounter and explore the spaces behind and within the work and that special tension, described by Tillyer as the ‘kiss’, where void meets painting.

While inspired by nature and often described as a landscape artist, Tillyer is also fascinated by the conceptual artifice of painting. The Golden Striker is an expression of both this and the beating, performative aspect of painting made manifest in a title which also references the virtuoso percussion at the heart of a work by the John Lewis Jazz quartet.

The exhibition will include two other works from this group of Tapestry paintings, a still life and an Esk Bridge landscape, accompanied by a group of smaller paintings. The River Esk and the arching bridge over it has been a long-time fascination, appearing in numerous paintings during Tillyer’s 60 years as an artist and it is fitting that he has returned to this subject again for this special exhibition which marks such a significant milestone. The subject conveys both the passage of time and the solidity and unchanging quality of the landscape in which they reside as well - as the enduring appeal of form and particular subjects for this remarkable British artist.

The exhibition is free to attend and will be held between the 26th of September and the 24th of November.