Mackenzie Thorpe
Works:
Freedom To Dream
Where’s All The Beer Gone?
She Loves Me
See You Monday George
Out For a Walk
Lunch Time in South Bank
Love By The Pale Moonlight
Long Was the Night
Life in the Land
The Last Temptation
It’s A Drying Day
Hope They’re In
Great Journey
A Telegraph Pole
A Good Morning Kiss
Bio:
Mackenzie Thorpe was born and raised in an industrial town in northern England and today lives in a charming Yorkshire village of Richmond among the friends and family he depicts with such tenderness, passion and humor. His house is a 4 story Victorian period house with a beautiful lawn and garden with mature trees and flower beds to the rear. The house with its stunning stained glass door with windows and French doors offers sweeping views of the garden. His wife disclosed that the lovely drapes in the dining room and living room were bought at a Roman Shades online store. They were very distinctive. The dining room roman shades were what is called a London shade that combines formality and tailored elegance for a slightly softer look. They really were an elegant shade style that fell from inverted pleats, forming gentle swags along the bottom with fanned wings on each side. She said they were visible in several of Mackenzie Thorpe’s drawings. A similar style called balloon shades were in the living room perfectly creating high drama and a formal elegance that was soften with the vases of garden flowers on the side tables and several cats longing in the sunlight. I recognized both roman shade styles in some sketches that were on a table and in several of his pieces at the Hanson Gallery.
Mackenzie, who is dyslexic, relies on his artwork to guide him in his life. “Drawing was my escape. I’ve drawn all my life, whether it was with pencils on discarded cigarette packets or what I’m doing now.” Many of the images, all created with pastels, that are displayed in the Hanson Gallery collection, Thorpe makes in his small studio. They have an almost childlike appeal.
His work takes us to his early days in the Yorkshire shipyards, or more recent days spent playing with his children; but in every case, they are a vivid expression of the challenges we all face, the victories we achieve, and most importantly, the hope we carry within our hearts.
Thorpe’s popularity has created a collectors’ frenzy in some corners of the art world and include such celebrities as Elton John, former Rolling Stone Bill Wyman and Princess Anne. However, he is anything but pretentious about his popularity as he talks in a heavy dialect about growing up in the poverty in industrial Middlesbrough, the oldest of seven children, his struggle with dyslexia and his despair and suicide attempt at 17 when he was laid off from his shipyard laborer’s job. His phrases are laced with words more likely to be heard in pubs than art galleries. Thorpe’s work sometimes has a dark side, showing faceless working-class figures. But odd shapes and eccentric vantages help retain a playful tone that his fans find irresistible and his work sells so fast these days Thorpe can’t keep up with demand.
** Nano Lopez **
Works:
Savannah
Savannah
Savannah
Goat
Spring
Phillip the Second
Two Elephants
Gato Lato
Ave
Curioso
Matilda on Her Way to Market
Elephant
Lizard
Horse
Gatin
Life Size Curioso
Papagayo
Bio:
Born in 1955 in Bogota, Columbia, Nano Lopez has studied extensively in Europe and has worked with sculptors such as Francisco Baron and Manuel Isquierdo. Nano’s subject matter deals primarily with figurative and architectural elements, combining his classical training with his experimentation in new sculpting media. The result is an avant garde art which combines strong aesthetic considerations and rich textural surfaces. Nano’s work captures the inner life of our time and provides us with a mirror for contemporary society and the spirit of modern man.