Dr Mike Tremblay

Much guidance on abstract art focuses on what I call ‘the inner game of art’, that abstraction is done through internal reflection alone. That is, though, as true as using the external world of our senses as a bridge to stimulate that inner game. If I am on the right track, abstract art is the […]

Abstraction is a liberation from the strictures that can bind our lives as lived. Many people take art classes and when looking at what they have done, feel undernourished, incomplete, frustrated, or worse. Indeed, by the end of the art class, the art ‘thing’ is done, but it isn’t quite right and like the hamster […]

Paint ‘in the moment’, simply see what would happen if…, if you did this and then that. Painting in the ‘here and now’ or ‘in the moment’ does not mean that I am being careless. I am interpreting how I feel, my mood, what I am thinking at that particular moment, which of course will […]

Creativity is neither right nor wrong; it just is. That does not mean it lacks ethical impact or is neutral in the expression of ideas. I am an advocate of Isabelle Graw’s interpretation of the painting as a type of ‘quasi-person’ (Thinking through painting: reflexivity and agency beyond the canvas, Sternberg Press, 2012). My own […]

You do not need to be able to draw to be creative. This is one of the great lies of art, that it always begins with drawing, sketching. Many people take life classes, drawing the human form, or still life classes, bowls of fruit or a vase of flowers. But the most expressive artists were […]

The EDF nuclear power station in Dungeness in Kent, UK may be an exotic place to visit, but it made for an excellent exhibition space. Myself along with other artists from Ashford Visual Artists exhibited our work over a period of months in 2017. EDF was an excellent host, and turned over to us an […]

My solo exhibition, Chromophilia, was held at the Evegate Art Gallery from 3 to 24 December 2016. Works are on paper and wood. The gallery is open from 1000 to 1500 Monday to Saturday (but not Sundays). Evegate Art Gallery is in the Evegate Business Park, which includes retail shops and restaurants. It is located […]

Departing from my usual commentary on arts subjects, I would like to let folks know that I have been accepted into the 2016-17 Turps Art School Correspondence Course.  This will be a challenging opportunity and I look forward to working with my mentor/tutor. At this time, I don’t know who the other artists are in […]

Marion Milner, a celebrated child psychoanalyst wrote of her own creative anxieties in her book On Not Being Able to Paint (Heineman, 1950, but still available). Fear is embedded in much of the writing on creativity, mainly because creativity is a public expression of internal life. It is a form of exposure, and ever mindful […]

“Hinge-point: the social media and technology revolution in the art world” Originally published in Art of England, Issue 65, 2010. Reproduced with permission. Recently, I went to an exhibit of a friend, who with colleagues, produced a piece called “Cases” using iPod videos as an installation probing the nature of health and the senses – […]

“where do you go to my lovely when you’re alone in your bed?” (title from the song with lyrics by Peter Sarstedt, 1969, listen to it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRDaeLs69i4 ) Originally publised in Art of England, Issue 76, 2011. Reproduced with permission. Fantasy, imagination and dreaming have been acknowledged sources of artistic inspiration as well as […]

“Frankenfolks” can be artists too!” Originally published in Art of England, Issue 86, 2011. Reproduced with permission. Are older people curiosities, especially the long-lived? Do we see them as ‘marvellous’ simply for their fact of survival. Perhaps instead, we trap others in the medico-social web of nursing homes, expensive end-of-life care, and dependency on others. […]