G Nielsen Art

Biography

I'm a 32 year old artist living a quiet little life on the North West coast of Ireland where I'm very fortunate to say that the majority of my lifes chaos occurs in front of my easel. I've suffered a lifelong fixation on the human body - how it works, how it moves, how varied its shapes and abilities can be. As a teenager it manifested in hours every week spent watching Gunther Von Hagens videos, in my twenties it motivated me through a science degree specializing in human anatomy, and in my adulthood it's settled into an artistic passion. I have observed and learned and understood, and now my aim is to capture, express and celebrate.

Artist Statement

Why do I paint figure skaters? I get asked this question a lot, and I always wonder if artists like Jamal Akib and Jacob Dhein get asked why they paint dancers? Add a pair of skates and a spin so fast the eye can't process it and suddenly you need a justification. So here's mine:

I've been painting with oils for about six years now and most of that time has been spent trying to capture the movement, emotion and physicality of elite level figure skating. While I love a bright, full sun landscape, and my cats feature regularly, it's figure skaters that own my artist's heart. I don't have a single muse - I have a whole sport of them.

You will never see a human spin so fast on their own feet, never watch a person hurl themselves backwards through the air, rotating as they fly and somehow still landing with elegance, in any other context. Figure skaters are artists in their own rights, weaving together multiple stories on ice: the story of the program; the story of their career; the story of their life. The best skaters reveal every layer - a gift that can only be given by a true artist. I aim to paint those stories and express those feelings, with my own interwoven because in art they always are. Speed and rotation, skill and dedication, trust and recklessness, yearning and triumph.

To appreciate any piece of art you have to be willing to engage with it. You have to look past what it is and search for what it is trying to say, what it's trying to show you. You have to want to feel it with me. I would be honored if you would allow me to show you these incredible women - just a fraction of a second of their lives and ask you to look at it and see what I see.