Utopia: The Unexpected Gallery is based in the heart of Holt, near the north Norfolk coast. It is an independent gallery owned by husband and wife, Michael Slaney and Jac Scott. It’s not just another gallery - it is the 'Unexpected Gallery' in every way. Proudly not a white cube space, but one that juxtaposes curated antiques with contemporary art.

The gallery is filled with contemporary fine art created by founder Jac Scott. Jac's art practice is without creative boundaries. She paints original oils evocative of the local land and seascapes plus she draws black and white studies of Norfolk's wildlife and landscapes. These are available in the gallery as limited edition prints complemented by open edition prints featuring a single colour block. There are also original oil paintings of fruit, vegetables and fish adorning antique plates, creating small still life masterpieces to hang on your wall. Also made in-house is the Enigma Variations Collection, where unusual tiny antiques are displayed under glass domes adorned with vintage butterflies from unwanted museum collections. Plus there are greeting cards which are unusual and very collectable.  Jac Scott's work is only available from Utopia - she is too busy creating for her own gallery to supply anyone else!

Utopia has a refined selection of artists-in-residence including: nationally renowned wildlife sculptor David Cooke who makes stunning animal sculptures from stoneware - suitable for inside or outside display as they are frost proof. Plus there is internationally acclaimed Christy Keeney, a ceramicist who creates charming figurative sculptures in his own unique style. Whilst local sculptors, Cindy Lee Wright and Shaun Pickering, make striking and engaging metal and wood sculptures of the local flora and fauna.

To enhance this dynamic offering, each month the gallery invites a guest artist to exhibit. With a strong emphasis on three-dimensional pieces, the monthly exhibition provides a refreshing themed show.

There's a great relaxed vibe in Utopia, where Gloria the levitating gull welcomes you before the friendly staff say hello. Customer service is obviously a priority -  they never make you feel pressured or rushed. Jac's mission is to offer accessibly priced art, so it's not surprising that they have a very loyal following after ten years since inception.  On most Saturdays you can usually see the artist herself working in the gallery and chatting to customers.

Artist Jac Scott is the founder of Utopia: The Unexpected Gallery and is a multi-award winning visual artist, a member of the Royal Society of Sculptors with an international exhibition portfolio. Scott's work is in private and corporate collections across the globe.

The Agony and the Ecstasy of Oil Painting

A friend recently asked me if I ever get bored painting the coast? My reply came easily - the coastline is always changing, in every second it metamorphoses. Aiming and failing to capture that energy or tranquility is so bewitching that I'll never master it or tire of trying to do so.

Painting the Norfolk Coast

The elements of sky, sea and shore dance and shift continually. It's the movement and the interplay of the elements that is beguiling. Standing before the ocean and absorbing the sights, sounds and smells to carry home to the studio, is both humbling and invigorating. I find making short videos of the panorama can help the journey, but nothing matches the initial excitement of the moment. Doing quick sketches and colour studies are an intrinsic part of the process. The large scale I prefer to work at demands a big set up, so it is highly problematic working on location.

Painting Simple Compositions with Complicated Layers

The compositions are rudimentary - I really like that. Capturing the viewer's eye without an obvious focal point demands other elements of interest and nuance. Colour and texture are key.  The process is dynamic. It makes it even more challenging to carry that simplicity and create a picture that has depth, movement and spirit. The techniques I use embraces this - nurturing the notion of shifting layers. Visualising and then building the layers is a multi-pronged operation where understanding three-dimensions is critical. One is building from the back of the painting and seeing forward - therefore planning is key.

Each element is faceted like colours - their translucency or opaqueness is important to exploit the medium's variables. Subject matter such as skies and seas envelop the multi-layered approach and react well to embracing different strengths of coloured layers.

Emotional Painting

Yes the paintings are emotional expressions, not copies of anything stagnant.  I want them to be transitional - to carry one to another place - to form a ticket to ride. Painting requires concentration and control, and yet however much you master the materials, there is always an element of serendipity that I love. That unexpected joy or horror that emerges when you think it's safe. This duality of agony and ecstasy whilst painting becomes a canvas full of problems to solve and I am elated if I manage to master them. Such an absorbing activity is demanding both mentally and physically, especially when I work on the big panels. The width and longevity of my art practice definitely informs my painting. It has nuances towards sculpture - planning in three dimensions, layering and cutting back.

Moving to North Norfolk

I grew up by the sea and regularly spent hours watching the waves, never thinking that those early memories would guide my focus now. When we moved from Bournemouth to the Lake District I was still needing to regularly visit the coast and share the big skies away from the brooding mountains. Moving to North Norfolk was liberating - it is a special place: a sanctuary and a stimulus for my spirit and my art practice. We had visited for seven years before we decided to move permanently - it was the best thing we ever did.

Captivated

When Michael and I first saw Cindy Lee Wright's sculptures at the Cley Wildlife Centre we were mesmerised by the linear drawing quality of the pieces. It was as if she had drawn them in the air, creating animals and birds with a sensitivity not often found in this style of work. It was easy to imagine a visual dialogue with my drawings - a counter play of materials yet a meaningful conversation. The marks of ink contrasting dynamically with the pierced steel.

Materials Matter

The laser cut sculptures are clearly defined making identification of the subject a joy. Whilst the careful selection of wooden mounts and bases enhance the subject in a considered manner. Cindy also selects the finish of the steel, polished, rusted or flamed, to add another layer of interest. 

Locations

The sculptures can be situated inside or out making endless exciting possibilities for locations. Against a sunlit wall the shadows of the sculptures echo the graphic. Placed amidst a garden the plants form a natural backdrop but also a moving infill. Inside, the skeletal forms can create complicated windows through which to peer. When lit the tracery forms a ghostly doppelgänger to admire.

Big Wild Sky

Norfolk is a place of big skies and beautiful wildlife. Norfolk artist, Cindy Lee Wright, writes about her passion for the local wildlife as a constant inspiration. 

"I am so lucky to live on a marsh bordering the Norfolk Broads with so much wildlife for inspiration; the barn owls, the nesting herons, the cries of passing curlews. I hope these steel pieces help to bring a sense of the beauty of the wild that we are privileged to live alongside in this county." Cindy Lee Wright

We are honoured to have Cindy as a guest artist throughout November and look forward to creating a stunning exhibition of her wonderful work.

 A simple story of a painting.

Sometimes it’s the simple pleasures of living in this beautiful county that bring a lingering smile, such as looking forward to the casual, yet dynamic blooming of the wild poppies in June. The impact can be just a single lost flower or the invasion of a whole field swathed in red.

 But usually it’s a graceful lacing of the field edges - red heads of delicate crepe paper petals bobbing in the breeze.

This June on a winding lane from Edgefield, near Holt, there was a particularly wonderful field of poppies - so inspiring I had to paint the view.

2020 saw the start of a whole new portfolio of paintings for artist Jac Scott.  Fluid Lands emerged through the lockdown as the artist was able to dedicate significant studio time to developing the new work with pigments and wax.  The Storm Collection was the initial response now followed by Linear Lands.

Each work is a unique response to local Norfolk sea and land scapes.

Inspiration - Linear Lands Collection

North Norfolk, with its big skies and undulating vistas, specialises in creating layered wide and sinuous bands of landscape.

There is a rhythmic poetry where the bands of interest stretch across the land forming stripes of colour, texture and form. This striping delineates and dissects the panorama leading to an inspiration that explodes across the canvas - broad strokes of emotion and energy captured in paint.

Technique - Encaustic Painting

The ancient method of encaustic art was practiced by the Greeks and Egyptians with 2000 year old examples still in existence. Wax and pigments are fused with heat which dries quickly capturing brush strokes, drips and textures. Encaustic art is an all consuming very physical practice.  One is seduced by the process of not just applying paint with a brush, palette knife or hands, but also the harnessing of heat to energise materials and move the liquids around. The fluidity of the process allows the materials to mix and metamorphose.

East View, Burnham Overy Staithe, Norfolk

The coastal path elevates the walker to view a wide vista of lines on the landscape where reeds, stream, bank, grass, hedge and sky form natural bands.

Phacelia, Hindolveston, Norfolk

Bands of wonder in a local meadow where phacelia forms a lacy border to rustling wheat, dwarfed by a row of Scots pines.

Phacelia is a wonder plant. It has beautiful scented purple flowers with dense fern-like foliage. It smothers weeds and has an extensive root system that improves soil structure  - it is often used as a green manure. It grows quickly showing blooms for 6-8 weeks - providing an excellent cut flower and one of the top flowers for bees and hoverflies.