oli mumby
pastel & acrylic on board
Growing up in the 80s in a suburb of South Manchester, Oli Mumby had future ambitions of pig-farming in rural France. He became an advertising creative in central London instead. He is now a landscape artist in the Peak District and not convinced the French dream is going to be realised
The rural setting and landscape of Derbyshire and the Peaks drew Oli away from London and continues to be his artistic inspiration today. Captivated by colour and form, Oli creates his work in response to the inherent beauty he sees within his surroundings. His work is concerned with the notion of looking more intensely and truly appreciating the world around us: how light, colour and space really work; how together they shape our experience of the world, and how wonderful it is to record and represent this intense ‘seeing’ through art
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Oli works predominantly in pastel, enjoying the directness and physicality of the medium and process; blending a distinctive palette of colour and building layers, often in collage, using pastel worked into paper
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Oli always works from observation at the beginning and often finishes with work of a semi-abstract aesthetic. He views his work as being ‘about’ somewhere rather than being ‘of’ somewhere – hinting at a narrative or capturing and celebrating what connects him to the place
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