About

Paul Hannon comments on his work:

My main interest in painting is in observing coastal and landscape forms of Atlantic Canada. All of my paintings are connected through a common concern for the depiction of light. This light is a low-angled, northern light with long and deep shadows. The main quality of the light I work with is warmth. This warmth penetrates all my painting concerns.

Another of my main concerns is color. I attempt to paint with a unified palette, using colors that support one another. The colors are there for a reason, not a specific one, just that they seem to fit. I tend to use a fair amount of bright color, yet this is usually balanced with neutrals . One of the neutral colors I rely on is gray, which unifies and supports the bright colors. Each of my paintings is a working process to find new and harmonious ways of using color.
           
I begin painting through compositional sketches. I take things apart and re-arrange the parts as I develop the composition. Collage-like compositional process is key to my work. I use many parts and reassemble them into a final sketch. Based on this drawing, I begin to re-draw this scale image larger onto the full size canvas in the scale that seems most appropriate to the image. The initial color ideas begin to happen as a kind of journey through the painting process. The color develops along with the details and I continue to paint, repaint and edit as I go. I feel that journey is complete when I arrive back at the beginning, appreciating the beauty of the phenomenal world .

I have an ongoing interest in producing representational work based upon light, color and illumination. The main concern of my work is to achieve a particular feel, evoking a glowing stillness that radiates an alive sense of realism. The kind of pictoral realism within which I work is straightforward yet mannered. The straightforward or representational quality is in the details of light and shadow. Things look like things, whatever the thing depicted is a bush or a boat. I use light and shadow to build up a realistic sense of a place.

Sometimes the mannered quality (my personal style or imprint) is much more visible in the final painting. The mannered aspect of my work is the way in which I present these images when I play with realism, sometimes exaggerating the colour and form to make a visual point. In some of my paintings, Im working with a realistic scene, yet the warm and cool colour relationships are exaggerated. The building, boats and foreground bushes are also composed in a way to help present the image in a flattened and therefore mannered way. It appears like a real scene and yet it looks a bit different. This is intentional and natural to me. It's my artistic process.

Biographical Information:

Paul Hannon studied at the State University of New York at Oswego where he majored in Fine Arts. His training focused on drawing, painting and printmaking with special emphasis on the areas of etching, screen-printing and lithography. Paul studied at Pratt Graphics in New York City with Anna Wong and studio painting with Elaine DeKooning as part of the Empire State College "Studio Without Walls" program in the seventies. Paul represented S.U.N.Y. Oswego at that program. Paul also studied watercolor media with Diana Kurtz at The Naropa Institute in Boulder, Colorado. Paul exhibited in California in the seventies and taught printmaking as artist-in-residence at The Venture Gallery in San Diego. He printed numerous limited editions for various artists. In the eighties, Paul started a screen-printing and display business in Boulder, Colorado. During that time, Paul gained experience in the practical and commercial applications of screen-printing as well as in sign and display manufacture. After moving to Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1989, Paul renewed his interest and passion for painting and has become well known in the Maritimes for his oil paintings, watercolors and drawings. Paul is represented in numerous public, private and corporate collections and continues to live and work in Halifax.