The work
Kimm’s work centres on direct observation; being on the spot, painting and drawing directly from life.
He enjoys the remote, the dramatic and the beautiful - the Scottish Highlands and west coast, the Picos de Europa in Northern Spain – spectacular mountains, exciting buildings, structures and bridges.
Kimm spends time in the landscape, painting and drawing directly from nature. The immediate challenge is to achieve a composition that captures the light, on site, in real time. The field work has an immediacy and spontaneous freshness all of its own.
Outdoor works form the basis for more formal paintings completed in the studio, where composition and structure come into their own. Here the challenge is to make the painting a mechanism to reconstruct and tell the event previously experienced: the tide running, the winter sun beating through cloud on the shortest day, a sudden squall across a loch. Shapes, colours and structure recreate that encounter on canvas. This leads to composition where rhythm and colour blend with image and meaning to create a piece that can have many levels.
Background
Kimm started drawing at the age of 8 and went on to study painting at Kingston Art College and the Royal Academy Schools in London. Throughout his practice, he pursues several creative strands: painting, making, inventing and teaching. He constantly explores ideas and developing them through painting, building creative playground installations, writing books on painting and running classes.