Love Letters to the Planet
Artist Tony Foster paints watercolor depictions of his world travels, accompanied by snippets of maps, handwritten notes, artifacts, and talismans
From Boundary Creek Looking W.S.W./ Haunted by a Bear, 2018
From Tony Foster’s Journey: Exploring Idaho’s Copper Basin
23 x 25 inches, Watercolor and Graphite on Paper, Map, Zuni Fetish
www.thefoster.org | gailseverngallery.com
THE ARTIST Tony Foster
KNOWN FOR Venturing forth from his home in a small village in Cornwall, England, Foster paints glorious watercolor “diary” depictions of his world travels, accompanied by snippets of maps, handwritten notes, artifacts, and talismans.
INTO THE WILD “I have always loved painting, writing, adventures, exploration and being out- doors—my way of working contains all these elements. I have been doing this work in the world’s wildest places for nearly 40 years. (I believe it has involved me in living in a North Face Tadpole tent for around 8 years!) The work is a celebration of wilderness and the fact that even in our seemingly over- crowded world, places of untouched natural wonder still exist. The American West has some of the most inspiring wild landscapes on the planet.”
WITH WATERCOLOR “It is the most portable medium. Painting on-site is key to what I do, and because I am often working on large-scale paintings in remote places, oil paint would be impossible—it would never dry, weighs too much, and get bugs, dirt and twigs stuck all over it.”
MORE THAN A PRETTY PICTURE “My paintings aren’t just about finding a particularly choice landscape and copying it; they are about time spent in wild places, the events that occur, the sounds, smells, encounters and observations. The diary sections elucidate that, the map pinpoints the location, and the collected objects are symbolic of human history, ethnography and politics, and are a direct connection to the natural environment. They prove I have been there.”
TAKING CARE “I have been an environmentalist all my life. My hope is that when people see my response to the singular beauty and extraordinary complexity of the planet which we inhabit together, it will strengthen their commitment to care for it and tread less heavily upon it.”
As seen in the July 2020 issue
