About Ian

I am an Artist, Gardener and Musician. More or less in that order

Artist

Originally training as a Civil Engineer I eventually decided that the world didn’t need any more roads and bridges and realised that I needed to do something more creative with my life. So, aged 29, I abandoned a perfectly good career and enrolled at Eastbourne College to study Art and Design. I have always been inspired by the English landscape (and by Artists who depict it especially Paul and John Nash, Eric Ravilious and John Piper) and I am particularly drawn to certain types of landscape – what I think of as Ancient Landscapes - ones that tell a story and where there is more going on than meets the eye, which is why you will often find standing stones, dolmen, chalk hill figures and trackways in my work.

Whilst most of my work is based on actual locations, I’m not trying to create an exact likeness of somewhere but more a sense of what it feels like to be there. To this end I tend to use colour to evoke an emotional response.

I originally studied painting when I was at Eastbourne College but in about 2008, I got into printmaking (particularly multi-block lino print) and this now forms the main part of my artistic output. The lino prints I create are painstakingly printed one colour at a time from carved lino blocks to form strictly limited editions, and are not at all like the ones you did at school!

In 2013 my lino print ‘Dartmoor Oak’ was selected to be part of ‘The Artist of the Year’ show (sponsored by ‘The Artists and Illustrators Magazine’) at the Mall Galleries and in 2016 I was commissioned to create a lino print for the cover for Mary Ann Ochota’s book ‘Hidden Histories: a spotters guide to the British landscape’

I am a member of the Sussex Arts Collective and regularly exhibit in shows at Gallery UNO in Seaford.

My work and a selection of greetings cards are available for sale from my Etsy shop, https://ianohalloranartist.etsy.com or you can contact me direct via email (imohalloran@gmail.com) or by using the contact form on this website.

Facebook: www.facebook.com/ianohalloranartist Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ian.ohalloran.artist/

Gardener

In 1994 my wife and I moved to our current property to embark on our life’s work of transforming a 5-acre field into gardens for self-sufficiency and wildlife, what we call our garden-smallholding (www.morethanjustagarden.co.uk).

Musician

I started playing the guitar in 1974 and never got round to stopping. I met my wife when we were both playing in the same band. We don’t play live anymore but I continue to compose so I’m still inflicting my music on anyone who will listen (www.soundcloud.com/axe-head).