Guy Warner
"I am in love with the ancient landscapes of the British Isles and in particular, my local countryside in the Cotswold Hills."
Guy loves capturing the countryside through changing light, weather, and seasons, and the vibrant colour palette I use conveys the joy he feels being out in nature.
Guy takes great inspiration from the art and design of the early twentieth century when stylish depictions of rural Britain flourished, especially in the form of tourism posters.
Those designers used colour and form purely and powerfully, and Guy wishes to do the same, creating paintings that are, he hopes, uplifting and evocative of time and place.
Guy Warner is a Cotswolds-based landscape painter whose work celebrates the ancient landscapes of the British Isles, particularly the countryside surrounding his home in the Cotswold Hills.
Guy's paintings are rooted in the experience of walking through the landscape and observing it through changing light, weather and seasons. Photographs taken on these walks become sketches for paintings developed in the studio, allowing him to transform familiar views into vibrant, atmospheric interpretations of the countryside.
Colour is central to Warner’s work. His vivid palette conveys the sense of joy and freedom he experiences when immersed in nature, while his compositions explore the relationship between the structured lines of the manmade world — tracks, buildings and pathways — and the softer, ever-expanding forms of vegetation, trees and clouds.
Warner draws inspiration from the art and design of the early twentieth century, particularly the bold colour and simplified forms of British tourism posters of the 1920s and 30s. His work also reflects the influence of the Impressionists, Post-Impressionists and Fauves, alongside the British artists of the Bloomsbury Group and painters such as Samuel Palmer, Paul Nash and John Nash.
A recurring theme is the dominance of nature over the manmade world. Warner often removes modern distractions such as road signs and electricity pylons, creating landscapes that sit somewhere between reality and imagination. Rather than recreating an idealised past, however, his paintings are his interpretation of the rural England of today — seen through the heightened sense of freedom and discovery he experiences while walking.
Ultimately, Warner’s aim is to capture that moment of excitement when a new path opens up and the landscape reveals something unexpected. His paintings invite the viewer to step into that world and share in the sense of freedom, discovery and joy that he finds in the Cotswold countryside.