The Art Circus See more on The Art Circus
Flight of the churches

by Brigid Marlin

The art of Brigid Marlin describes a visionary world of almost unlimited dimensions and self-sufficiency ...when I first saw The Rod I was so impressed by its imaginative sweep that I sent an enthusiastic letter of appreciation to her, the only fan letter I have ever sent to a painter. The sense of a clearly realised poetic universe, in which every detail, however modest, was accorded equal attention, was what most gripped my imagination. Surrealism, which had played a large part in forming my own view of the world, had seemed to falter with the death or old age of its greatest practitioners - Max Ernst, Magritte, Dali and Delvaux - and here in Brigid Marlin was a painter who might be the first of the next generation. I remember writing her with as much excitment as I felt when I came across the paintings of Francis Bacon in the 1950’s. The surrealist dream of remaking the world and revealing its true nature seemed to live on in the work of this woman painter ... in the best and most ambitious of her paintings we see clearly her dramatic and visionary remaking of the world, but this regeneration of life and space and spirit is present even in her smallest and most domestic images. In her work, as in the greatest of the surrealists, archaic myth and spiritual apocalypse meet and fuse.
 
- J. G. Ballard
Brigid Marlin was born in Washington, D.C., studied at the National College of Art, Dublin, the Centre d'Art Sacre, and the Atelier André L'Hote, Paris, the Beaux-arts, Montreal, and the Arts Students League of New York. Later she went to Vienna to learn the 'Mische' technique, a process of painting which was a carefully guarded secret of the Flemish and Italian Renaissance painters, and revived after painstaking research by Ernst Fuchs.
Returning to England, she founded the "Inscape" group of painters to continue the exploration and research into techniques of painting; and later the world between painters, sculptors, print-makers and jewelers. She teaches painting at West Herts. College and in London.
In 1982 she was resident artist at the Dorland Mountain Colony and in 1985 she was resident artist and painting teacher at the Carl Rogers Center for the Study of the Person, at the University of California.
In 1985 she illustrated Mary O'Hara's book, "Celebration of Love". In 1989 she wrote a book "From East to West" which was published by Collins Fount. In 1990 she was commissioned to paint a headmaster of Cheam School, Berks. Her work is in the National Portrait Gallery, London, and museums and collections all over the world.
Brigid Marlin is the founder of the Society for the Art of Imagination. The society holds an annual exhibition at the Mall Galleries, London. The exhibition is open to all artists working in the realms of the fantastic, surreal and visionary.
For more details please   Email Brigid.


Publications
Recent Exhibitions
  • Exhibition at the Philadelphia Institute of Technology, 2007.
  • Opening of the Vienna Art Park and Museum for Fantastic Art with work from the Society for Art of Imagination, 2007.
  • Exhibition at the Visionary Art Center, Miami, 2007.
  • H.R. Giger's Castle Museum and Art Gallery, June 17 - October 7, 2006.
  • Festival of the Society for Art of Imagination, London, 2005.
  • Society for Art of Imagination, European Tour, 2004.
  • Brave Destiny, Williamsburg Art Center, New York, October 2003.
  • The Gallery, Cork Street, London, 2002 and 2003.
  • "Visions of Venice" Exhibition of Paintings by Brigid Marlin inspired by Venice
    Portals Ltd, Chicago, November 17 - December 20, 2000.
  • Third Open Exhibition of the Society for Art of Imagination, Mall Galleries, London, October 2 - October 7, 2000.
  • The BBC acquired the portrait of Cecil Lewis, one of the founders of the BBC, to hang in the boardroom at Bush House. Opening ceremony on June 3, 1999.
  • Recent Works by Brigid Marlin, Nine Clarendon Cross, Holland Park, London, May 29 - June 10, 2000.
  • "Phantastik am Ende der Zeit" at the Stadtmuseum Erlangen-Nurnberg, Germany, April 2 - July 30, 2000.
  • The Mayfield Gallery, Bournemouth, 1997.
  • Exhibition of Recent Paintings at Portals Ltd. Chicago, May 17 - August 7, 1996.

 Prizes Include:

  • The 'Visions of the Future' Science-Fiction painting competition, 1st prize International Art Appreciation Award 1984, U.S.A., 1st prize
  • International Art Appreciation Award 1984, U.S.A., 1st prize
  • International Painting Competition, Dublin 1988, 1st prize
  • Upper Street Gallery Sculpture Competition, special prize