Words by Mercedes Smith
Maria Floyd’s stripped back interpretations of the Dartmoor landscape prove less is truly more.
Artist Maria Floyd tells me she was just 16 when she decided to become a painter: easy decision, tough path to walk at that age, I reply. Maria, though, had talent and commitment, and she went on to study at Chelsea College of Art and to graduate from Goldsmiths College, two of the most prestigious art schools in Europe. At Goldsmiths, during the early nineties, she took the toughest and most in-depth academic route, studying for a combined Fine Art and Art History degree, and what she learned continues to influence the progression of her career.
“Goldsmiths was quite a shock for someone who had grown up with a love of figure drawing and the Renaissance,” says Maria. It was, and still is, a highly progressive school. “I was there in the wake of Damien Hirst, so it was an amazing time. I was pretty naive artistically speaking, so being exposed to such a wide variety of work by painters who were doing such extraordinary things really broadened my horizons.” In the studio, Maria and her fellow students were encouraged to “strip everything back, which was a good thing, to just question what we were making, and why”.
As her studies progressed, the emphatic colour and highly physical processes of artists like Mark Rothko and the American Abstract Expressionists became an important influence on her work. “It was also the scale and composition of Rothko’s work that inspired me,” she says, “and his ability to make each work sing with such a little amount on the canvas.” I immediately note that Maria’s own work might be defined in the exact same terms: large scale works which employ pure colour and minimal use of detail to maximum effect. “Rothko’s Chapel works were also a good bridge for me, because they were partly inspired by the art and architecture of French and Italian churches, by the awe and reverence you feel when you walk in, and that linked directly to my interest in Renaissance art.”
Awe and reverence are feelings I associate with large scale abstract works, but Maria’s works are clearly figurative, though broken down into simplified elements. Ideas of awe in her work relate entirely to her subject, the spectacular south west landscape, while her marks reflect the gestural movements of expressive abstraction. “I am always trying to express the power of the elements in my work,” says Maria, “to give a fleeting glimpse of a moment in the landscape, and the experience of being in it. It is so incredibly beautiful here,” she says of her home on the western edge of Dartmoor. “It’s the wildness of the place, that’s what I love about it. It is one of our last grand, empty landscapes. The sky here is vast, and you can look out across the moor and not see a single person or anything man made. That leaves room only for the weather, which is different every day. I can go to the same spot each day to sketch and it will never look the same. In fact, I don’t explore as much as I should because one place can keep inspiring my work for weeks on end, but that develops a real intimacy I think. You have to spend a lot of time in a place before you can properly express it. That’s when you get to develop a kind of shorthand in your drawing and painting, because a place has become so familiar.”
TOP: ‘Another Land’ – mixed media on canvas BOTTOM: ‘Walking Lines’ – mixed media on board.
I like Maria’s use of the word ‘shorthand’. It perfectly describes her recent works. Shorthand, by definition, is minimal notation that is highly charged with content: in the same way, Maria’s marks are simple but impactful notations on her subject. How, I ask her, does she begin to build these paintings full of lines, marks and drips. “I always start flat on the floor,” she explains, “especially with the very big works. I will have drawings all around me from my plein air sketchbooks, and other experimental drawings I’ve made in the studio. I work with charcoal first, to sketch out the composition. That’s the draughtsman in me. I like to keep drawing elements in my paintings.” I examine the long, liquid lines and the sgraffito detailing in her works. Even the incidental drips and runs seem almost drawn. “Then I will work into the surface, scraping back and dribbling paint, but I have to keep walking away because I don’t want to overdo it. That’s crucial, that the works are not overdone, that’s their strength.”
I ask her about the walking away, the back and forth, the classic tussle between artist and canvas. “There is always a tussle,” she says. “There is a battle going on. Sometimes the work gets the better of me, and sometimes I manage to keep control.” How then, does she know she has won, and the work is finished? “Quite simply, when I walk away, the ones that I’ve won I want to keep. The others go. I scrape them back and start again. A painting has got the better of me if it is overworked, if I have failed to achieve spontaneity and liveliness. And space on the canvas is very important. There has to be space for a personal relationship between the viewer and the painting. The painting must not bully the viewer.”
LEFT: ‘The Morning Remembered Me’ – mixed media on canvas RIGHT: ‘Edge of the Field’ -– mixed media on canvas
I agree with Maria entirely on that point. That is why I have always loved abstraction. Abstract art says ‘let’s talk’, while figuration says ‘take me or leave me’. “And scale is important too,” she adds. “It allows you to really express. You can be more gestural. Quite often I use my whole arm to paint, so I need space on the canvas. Scale brings a sense of gravitas to an artwork as well, it makes more of a statement. With big paintings you have to step back. They have more presence. You have to really respect an artwork to take it on, on that large scale, and to appreciate its independence from you.” We talk about the colours in her work. In contrast to the hot colours of the expressionist paintings she admires so much, Maria’s colours tend towards the cool, though they all have a vibrancy and glow. “I have always had a bias towards earth colours,” she tells me, “particularly greens and graphite now. Those colours arrived in my work when I moved to Devon.”
LEFT: ‘Following the Path’ – mixed media on canvas CENTRE: ‘Never Alone’ – mixed media on board RIGHT: ‘Where Others Walked’ -– mixed media on board
Maria previously lived in London, then moved to Trebarwith Strand in north Cornwall. “Like most people, we came to the South West specifically for the beauty of the landscape. Now we are in Devon, on Dartmoor, which I had never even seen before we moved here. I was completely surprised by it. I have never been a painter of tranquil landscapes, the work I made on the North Cornwall coast was always dramatic, but Dartmoor is something else. It is such a special place. It draws you in and can become quite an obsession. It has inspired me to really push my work, to strip things back even further in all my paintings, and to really find my voice. Dartmoor is that kind of truly commanding landscape.”
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