MOLLY VAN AMERONGEN

The impulse to paint is personal, and comes from a mixture of memory and imagination. I use photography and drawing in my work which sparks a recollection of things seen, which in turn allows the imagination to create a space which has not yet been seen. I work with oil, acrylic, pigments and collage. Pigments are amazing: you can mix the richest colours, colour without names, and it is a very physical way of making and thinking in colour.

 
 
 
 

It is important to me to spend time in other cultures (India, Morocco, Mexico), places where colour is central to the meaning of life, and a form of storytelling. I think it’s a good idea to replenish my palette every so often, to cleanse the doors of perception.

 
 
 

Drawing is also important to my picture-making, and I often take elements from the drawings to  create larger painted pieces. Collage has always been important for me, as a process that encourages  the various elements in my pictures to find their own places. I don’t think my arrangements have to  do with conscious order – more to do with what is called accident. 
I find inspiration comes from memories of a place, object  or feeling. Also galleries, landscapes, old films, music. I draw influence from the artists I love; a few of my favourites are Helen  Frankenthaler, Patrick Heron, Roger Hilton, Robert Motherwell, Howard Hodgkin and Mark  Rothko.  

You can tell so much about someone by what they have in their home. Be it art, furniture,  fabrics. I think objects can interact in such a beautiful way and artworks can look completely  different in different situations which I have always found interesting. 

Molly van Amerongen is a London-based Artist. She completed her BA in Fine Art at Newcastle University in 2015 and now works between her studio as a painter and as a freelance specialist painter and set designer. Having spent long stints working and living in both India and Mexico her interests lie predominantly in colour and the stories it can tell.