Bearpark Artists Co-operative (est. 1993) is an independent group of studio-based professional painters.

Paintings in oil, acrylic and watercolour, and drawings, are sold from the Studio Gallery. The artists exhibit regularly throughout the region. We accept commissions.

We also undertake murals and banners; and work in schools, hospitals, adult education and community groups.

Barrie Ormsby

"The colours and forms I have found in a patch of landscape in West Durham over the past thirty years find their way into many of the compositions I paint in the studio. These are often related to music.

Recently, I have been working on a large pastel series prompted by the story of evolution (Beginnings). I have contrasted this with a version of the story of Adam and Eve told in small oil paintings.

Sometimes I'm moved to work by an external event like the invasion of Gaza which led to a painting which began as a visual meditation on the square of David and the swastika.

Johnnie Foker SWLA

Artists For Nature Foundation Award Winner 2015. www.artistsfornature.com Member and currently Secretary of the Society of Wildlife Artists .www.swla.co.uk.

‘Birds are nearly always in my paintings, but the colours, textures and space that surround them are as important to me as the birds themselves. I try to recreate the atmosphere of a particular place – an autumn woodland with the rasp of a jay and the smell of damp oak leaves. I usually begin by spending time in the field – observing, absorbing, drawing.
I then work up ideas in to paintings in the studio, often using oil on board. I love the possibilities that oil paint offers and being able to model forms, change them and nudge them around or scrape them away altogether and start again.
The size of my work varies greatly from post card –size paintings to three and a half metre long drawings.
I feel very fortunate to have lived in areas that hold some fantastic wildlife whether it’s the hills of Durham, the luminous Norfolk landscape or the fragile lowland heathlands of Surrey where I grew up. They all have great variety and present multiple challenges of expression.’

Paintings are also on show at the Pinkfoot Gallery, Cley, Norfork or visit on-line at pinkfoot gallery

Romey Chaffer

"My work is a response to the woodlands and verges around my home. The mining heritage of west Durham has left a web of lanes, footpaths and disused railway tracks. Past work has been based on rivers, more recent work on the tangle of wild plants such as hogweed, bracken and gorse. Drawings and paintings produced outside, as well as photographs, are used for compositions in the studio."

To see more work, please visit: www.romeychaffer.com

Associated Artists:

Artist and Filmmaker Matt Smith has made a number of films with us. His work can be seen on his website https://mattjamessmith.com/

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