LAR CANN

The industrial workings of Bodmin Moor’s granite quarries and mineralogy frequently reoccur as a visual stimulus. Whereas I do not use metalliferous mining products directly as a visual reference in my work, there are quite a number of minerals that are, unearthed and scavenged from the spoil heaps of the county’s disused mines and Cornwall’s mining heritage. These references are made almost exclusively for their colour content, often in conjunction with the matrix of rock in which they are found. It is the natural relationships that frequently inform the compositions. These colours may well get modified in qualities of saturation and tone during the picture making process, but without direct observation of the specimens, the work would not have this as a starting point.

“Lar is a radical. He has that close look of enquiry. There is this decidedly intellectual streak to him – a rather scientific distance where he employs analytical resources to what he does. There are no vague responses-to-nature raptures. Like Descartes, he moves towards having distinct ideas. With his ‘direct observations from specimens in my collection’, he can be seen as a member of one of those learned societies that flourished in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, a man who looks into the nature of things without his mind being hampered by bias or irrelevance. He is a binary figure, taking the objective world and imposing subjective meaning onto it. This gives his painting a strangely complete quality, as if the two most important things have been united in a comprehensive visual plan. He is a kind of Joseph Wright of Modernism.”

Michael Carter, extract from Portraits Of The Artists 2018

Artist's CV

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2022 Sixty-Five – Twenty-Two, Retrospective, Artmill Gallery, Plymouth
2017 Dyworth Pow Gwyrven, Chapel Arts, Cheltenham
2014 Of Granite, Killas and Lodes, Artmill Gallery, Plymouth
2013 Tanner’s Restaurant (curated by Artmill Gallery), Plymouth
2008 Beyond the Eye’s Reach, Somerville Gallery, Plymouth
2007 One Above Zero, The Brownston Gallery, Modbury
2005 From The Maures to Carbilly, Southgate Arch Gallery, Launceston
2004 Somerville Gallery, Plymouth, Devon
2002 The Infinity of Blue, The Hall Gallery, Sterts Arts Centre, Liskeard
2000 PriceWaterhouse Coopers, Plymouth
1999 PriceWaterhouse Coopers, Plymouth
1998 PriceWaterhouse Coopers, Plymouth
1997 Coopers & Lybrand, Plymouth
1997 Three Themes Dower House Gallery, Lostwithiel
1992 Kreter + Partner, Hamburg, Germany
1989 Landforms, Figureforms Dower House Gallery, Lostwithiel
1978 Abbey Green Gallery, Bath

SELECTED GROUP AND MIXED EXHIBITIONS

2023 Mirrors and Windows, Ariel Centre, Totnes (three-person)
Terrain Two, St Endellion Literary Festival, St Endellion (two-person)
Artmill One Hundred, Artmill Gallery, Plymouth
21 Group, Theatre Royal, Plymouth
2022 Thompson’s Gallery, Marylebone, London
Plymouth Society of Artist at the Penwith, Penwith Gallery, St Ives
Plymouth Society of Artists, Theatre Royal Plymouth
2021 Lucinda Dalton Gallery, King’s Road, Chelsea, London
21 Group at the Penwith, Penwith Gallery, St Ives
South West Academy, Kennaway House, Sidmouth
Lucinda Dalton Gallery, Affordable Art Fair, Battersea Park, London
21 Group, Limekiln Gallery, Calstock, Cornwall
2020 Brownston Gallery, Modbury
2019 21 Group, Birdwood House, Totnes
Artmill One Hundred, Artmill Gallery, Plymouth
Lucinda Dalton Gallery, Affordable Art Fair, Battersea Park, London
Imagine Falmouth, Falmouth Art Gallery, Falmouth
Plymouth Society of Artists, Theatre Royal, Plymouth
2018 South West Academy, Delamore Park, Ivybridge
Brownston Gallery, Modbury
2017 South West Academicians at Penwith, Penwith Gallery, St Ives
Land and Water, Plymouth Society of Artists, Council House, Plymouth
2016 Brownston Gallery, Modbury
South West Academy Open, Exeter Castle, Exeter
Sherborne Abbey, Sherborne
Academicians Spring Show, Thelma Hulbert Gallery, Honiton
2015 Plymouth Society at Penwith, Penwith Gallery, St Ives
South West Academy, Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter
2014 Artmill 2, Dartmouth
Terrain, Royal Cornwall Museum, Truro (four person)
Plymouth Society of Artists, City Museum and Art Gallery, Plymouth
2013-2023 Penwith Society of Arts, Penwith Gallery, St Ives
2013 Hidden in Plain Sight, City Museum and Art Gallery, Plymouth
The Lens and the Easel, The Ariel Centre, Totnes
2012 South West Academy Open, gloss-Art, Exeter
Plymouth Society of Artists at St Ives, Mariners Gallery, St Ives
2011 South West Academicians, gloss-Art, Exeter
Edinburgh Art Fair, Corn Exchange, Edinburgh
Windsor Contemporary Art Fair, Windsor
Delamore Arts 11, Delamore House, Cornwood
2010 St Ives School, Martin’s Gallery, Cheltenham
South West Academicians, Kennaway House, Sidmouth
2009 Cornwall Revisited, Martin’s Gallery, Cheltenham
The Lander Gallery, Truro
Breaking the Mould, Bath Fine Art, Bath (three-person)
Artists of St Ives and the South West, City Museum and Art Gallery, Plymouth
2008-2023 Plymouth Society of Artists, Artmill Gallery, Plymouth
2008 South West Academy Open, Exeter College, Exeter
2007 Elgar and the Pastoral Tradition, Sterts Arts Centre, Liskeard
Belgrave Gallery, St Ives
Seven For Spring, Morley Contemporary Art, Tredis
2006-2023 St Ives Society of Artists, Mariners Gallery, St Ives
2006 Brownston Gallery, Modbury
Full Spectrum, Sherborne House, Sherborne
2005 The Little Picture Show, Rainyday Gallery, Penzance
2004 The Park Gallery, London
In Search of Ancient Voices, Duke Street Gallery, Newlyn (two-person)
2003 Spered Kelt Breton, Carhaix Plouger, Brittany
2002 Festival Interceltique de Lorient, Lorient, Brittany
2001 Crossings, Dick The Dog, Penzance (three-person)
Exposure – Teacher Artists in Cornwall, Royal Cornwall Museum, Truro
2000 20th Century British Painting, City Museum & Art Gallery, Plymouth
Harbour House Gallery, Kingsbridge, (awarded 1st prize)
Penzance Arts Club, Penzance
1999 Landforms Two, Archie Browns, Penzance (two-man)
The Sky, The Sea and The Bit In Between, Burton Art Gallery, Bideford
1998 Crown Courts, Truro
1996 Coopers & Lybrand, Plymouth
Sixth Annual South-West Figurative Awards, Sterts, Liskeard (commended)
1995 Cornwall Association for Art Education, County Hall, Truro,
1994 Modernism and the St Ives School, City Museum & Art Gallery Plymouth
1991 New Street Gallery, Plymouth
1990-2007 South-West Open, City Museum & Art Gallery, Plymouth
1986 Festival Interceltique de Lorient, Lorient, Brittany
1965-1968 Penwith Society of Arts, St Ives
1965-1988 Plymouth Society of Artists Annual, City Museum & Art Gallery, Plymouth

WORK IN PUBLIC, CORPORATE AND PRIVATE COLLECTIONS

Royal Institution of Cornwall
The University of Sheffield Heritage Collections
Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital Foundation Trust
Exeter Leukaemia Fund Charity
DB Publishing, High Wycombe
The Box, Plymouth
Work held in private collections in Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Dubai, England, Germany,
France, Holland, Mallorca, Saudi Arabia and the USA

SOCIETY MEMBERSHIPS

21 Group of Artists
Penwith Society of Arts: Committee Member 2014-2019
South West Academy of Fine and Applied Arts 2006-2022: Honorary Academician from 2024
St Ives Society of Artists: Chairman 2009-2012, Director 2009-2015
Plymouth Society of Artists: Executive and Selection Committee from 1986, Chairman from 2015