Interview with Sarah Jane Moon

17/04/15

Interview: Sarah Jane Moon 

Inside Portraits

Mall Galleries Learning Centre, London

16 – 19 April 2015

For Sarah Jane Moon, painting is “fundamentally the relationship between an artist’s senses and the subject’s presence.” Having trained in portrait painting at Heatherley School of Fine Art (2009-2011), Moon went on to receive commendations from both the Royal British Society of Sculptors and the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, from whom she was awarded the 2013 Bulldog Bursary.

Moon works primarily with oil on canvas and builds up layers, often painting objects in and out of the composition. She is keen to show her friends’ and sitters’ characters through both a visual likeness but also by the careful placement of objects that define them, such as books and postcards. Having spent some time in Japan, her work has a strong graphic element to it and she outlines her figures in black and flattens perspective, usually working from a photograph.

Her most recent work is her largest yet and depicts a dinner party with many of her friends crowded around the table, chatting and convivial. Above them hangs a stark black and white portrait of the lesbian author, Radclyffe Hall.

To watch this interview, please go to: http://www.studiointernational.com/index.php/sarah-jane-moon-inside-portraits-mall-galleries-bulldog-bursary

Review of Sarah Jane Moon: Portraits at 5th Base Gallery

01/11/13

Sarah Jane Moon: Portraits

5^th Base Gallery

23 Heneage Street, London, E1

27 October – 2 November 2013 (extended by one day)

The current recipient of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters’ Bulldog Bursary, Sarah Jane Moon, only became an artist in recent years, after arriving in the UK from her native New Zealand (via Japan, Australia and Malaysia). Taking a Diploma in Portrait Painting at the Heatherley School of Fine Art, where many of the tutors come direct from the Slade, trained her in a traditional manner, with focus being placed on perspective, drawing, and studies from life. Even before her course was over, though, Moon was beginning to rebel, and, in working from a photograph, she flouted the rules, but, at the same time, discovered a freedom which allowed her to see the resulting work more as a whole, with equal focus on objects behind the figure, rather than just as a sketch of the figure itself. For Moon, a portrait is about much more than just the head and shoulders of the sitter: it’s about the whole body, its posture, its location, and the belongings which hold significance for this person, speaking of his or her interests and concerns. 

To read the rest of this review, please go to: http://www.divamag.co.uk/category/arts-entertainment/art-review-sarah-jane-moon.aspx