Alec Cumming is a painter I’m excited to feature. He’s based in the U.K., and his work has an even greater international feel to it. Alec wants create work you can escape in and I definitely feel like I’m transported to a faraway and quite lovely place when I view his pieces. His work is contemporary, vibrant, playful, optimistic, and a little bit dreamy. It just makes me happy!

Learn more and read my Q&A with Alec, below.

---

5 Questions for Alec Cumming

1) What is your favorite kind of work to do at the moment?

At the moment I’ve been making a lot of oil on canvas. These have been mainly large scale works that are bright and playful, and are loosely based around the places in which I have spent long periods of time observing my surroundings. I tend to think I make my best work when I get a reaction from place and space, and this sense of space then finds itself in the work I make. What I hope the viewer experiences when they look at my work is the ability to lose themselves within it, to capture their own sense of escapism.  

2) What kinds of things inspire you?

Everything around me! I take ideas from collections of objects, fabrics, swimming pools, my dog! I love the response of object to light, this could be a formative object like a chair or a natural object like a palm tree. I find that certain light in sunny, tropical places always inspires me. I noticed this from living and traveling in tropical places across the world — India, Sri Lanka, California and the Mediterranean. It’s this type of bright, harsh light that is intense and resonates almost as if it vibrates onto you and everything around. I’m trying to capture that feeling of that heat and intense beauty of the light in my paintings, but I’m not trying to represent a direct copy of these views. These concepts and objects are like a bank of images that I can jump off from and go in any direction to create this type of sensation.  

3) Who else do you admire in the art space?

I love paintings and artwork by the Indian master, KG Subramanyan, the British artist Alan Davie, and the American giant Philip Guston. I’ve admired them all for a really long time and feel like their paintings resonate with me like a mixture of physical languages that I really relate to. In a more contemporary sense, I really like the current work of artists such as David Surman, BD Graft and Eddie Martinez.  

4) Coolest possession?

It’s not really a possession, but I can’t really make any productive work without my dog in the studio. Although I am much better at making work in a place on my own, I never really appreciated how much having another breathing being there seems to help me focus more — although my partner is not too impressed when he arrives home with an accidental dash of paint on him!  

5) Favorite quote or words to live by?

I don’t really have a favorite quote, but I’d always like to say to ‘stick to your guns’ and to always believe in your artwork and be creative in your own way, even when others don’t necessarily believe in you. Never stop doing what you love!  

---

To see more work:

Follow Alec on Instagram, or visit his site for more.

I hope everyone has a wonderful rest of the week!
xx—BB