HELEN THOMAS
Helen Thomas is a visual artist who works, predominantly with painting and drawing, in response to plants in the environment. Her practice combines both field work and working from her studio at The Art House in Wakefield.
Thomas has congenital Nystagmus, a complex eye condition characterised by wobbling or flickering of the eyes. Nystagmus affects Thomas’s vision and visual perception, causing blurred vision and oscillopsia (the illusory sensation that the stationary visual world is moving).
For Nature: Sensory, Thomas visited Walton Colliery Nature Park in October and November 2024. Thomas documented the site by taking photographs and videos of seed heads, leaves and reflections on the surface of the water, as well as tiny details of moss and lichen. She sketched, painted, and made ‘day notes’ in a sketchbook and on her phone to record sensory responses that she experienced.
Eyes darting, peripheral pull. Constant shifting light and reflection.
Adjusting focus to accommodate a different painterly translation
of sensation, a negotiation between perception and paint on paper.
The camera can’t capture what excites the eyes.
You can read more of Thomas’s day notes on her Instagram posts.
Thomas made a series of twelve small paintings whilst on site at Walton Colliery Nature Park and, in the studio, she created a large, layered, translucent painting.
website: helenthomasartist.com
instagram: @helenthomasartist
Walton Colliery Nature Park, 4th October to 20th November 2024
In October and November 2024 Helen visited Walton Colliery Nature Park, where she made this series of small paintings. Wrapped up in many layers of warm clothing, Helen sat on a ground mat, or camping stool, to paint. Each visit she returned to the banks of a stretch of the Barnsley canal (disused). Helen wanted to create a sense of sequence in these paintings. In addition to making paintings in the park she also took lots of photographs, and made sketches and day notes. 10th October: “Seeing between the looking. Painting between the seeing.”
[Image description: The surfaces of these small, landscape format paintings are densely covered in delicate lines and overlapping brush strokes that suggest wild plants and reflections on still water. The autumnal colours include many shades of green, flecks of pink and patches of bright sky blue.]
Seeing between the looking, painting between the seeing, 2024
Helen painted this large, layered piece on translucent paper in her studio; working both from memory and from photos and notes that she made on visits to Walton Colliery Nature Park. The title of this piece “Seeing between the looking, painting between the seeing” is taken from a note that Helen made in her sketchbook on 10th October 2024. The materials, colours, marks and the translucent, layered form of this painting are informed by the topography and the plants, visual perception, and diverse effects of light experienced whilst working on site the nature park. The viewer’s experience will differ according to a number of factors including: the time of day and the weather, whether light is passing through or bouncing off the surface. In making this piece Helen also considered that there are many ways of seeing, and that people will view the painting from a differing eye levels.
[Image description: A large painting made on layered translucent paper. The surfaces are covered with a fragmented network of sketchy, plant-like brushstrokes. The front layer partially obscures and blurs the appearance of brushstrokes on the layer at the back.]