Many people, myself included, seem to think that we must achieve all our goals early on in life, as quickly as possible, before time runs out.

Then what?

Then we retire.

We see our retirement as a time to wind down, to mow the lawn, and to enjoy the peaceful life that we’ve earned. Would it ever occur to us that retirement doesn’t have to be just the end of a career, but the beginning of a new one?

Bren Head is a fantastic example of a person who stares down that withered depiction of pensionhood, and puts it in its place – on canvas. Born Blyth, in Northumberland, in 1949, Bren worked internationally in the catering trade before retiring to North Yorkshire. In her own words, “not one to remain idle for long,” she soon busied herself by undertaking an Art Foundation Course at Yorkshire Coast College in Scarborough, soon followed by a BA (Hons) in Fine Art at the University of Hull.

An uncontrollable fire in the Yorkshire Moors, lasting almost a week, peeled back the top layer of the landscape, revealing Britain’s most important prehistoric archaeological find, and which would become the muse of Head’s early works.

“Living very close to the moor and indeed the fire itself, meant that I was able to walk the site, as well as using aerial photos provided by English Heritage, to produce abstract oil and mixed media paintings, using textural surfaces, produced using a variety of supports and techniques, to suggest symbols of time’s erosion. My intention was to show the marks made by man on the landscape, and at the same time the influence of the elements on their erosion and disintegration.”

When asked about the inspiration for her more recent work, Head explained: “New work has evolved to include semi- figurative and figurative paintings based on these traces and remains of past life. On a visit to Crosby Beach, near Liverpool, I visited Antony Gormley’s ‘Another Place’ and returned to my passion for the figure. His amazing sculptures fascinated me in the same way; their disintegration of form and structure tested by the elements.”

She continued: “I have a fascination with people. I am the person you find staring at you on the train, at the bus stop, taking in features, wondering about your life, why you look so tired, how life has modelled your character. Then I paint…no one in particular.”

There is an almost eerie nakedness to Head’s portraiture that is all at once intriguing, captivating and unsettling. It’s like looking into a mirror and seeing all the emotions you’ve ever felt in your life displayed across your face.

“Whether painting intimate, isolated single heads or groups of figures, I try to create an emotional and evocative atmosphere using distortions and exaggerated features. Surfaces may become damaged, torn or partially destroyed. Layers erode the surface to reveal a history from where the subject is excavated as an analogy of archaeology, unearthing the past, as well as looking to the future - a process of discovery.”

Head’s unusual style produces a haunting effect that seems to reveal a lifetime of feelings, expressed through colour, shadow and skin-like layers, each revealing a different phase of life. It is fascinating to stare into her portraits and wonder how life has weathered the faces.    

“My current work examines the ageing process using intimate, emotional, haunting, facial expressions with their steady gaze confronting us directly, uneasy undertones which hold attention and cause an interaction between portrait and viewer.
More than a likeness, more than a visual recognition, more than a resemblance.”

These portraits, despite their abstract style, are in many ways more personal and more exposing than photo-perfect portraits, which through their neatness, can be emotionally more obscure.  Much like in social photographs, some people will always display the same face to a camera – that perfectly composed smile. But often the best photos are the ones that are spontaneous and natural - rare. They say more about the mood of a moment than a practiced grin. I was interested to know about the materials Head used to create layered effect on the canvas:

“I'm very much a mixed media person!
I'll try anything and everything.
I like to experiment.
I work by intuition rather than pre-meditation.”

When asked if she followed a particular process, and how she achieved the overall effect she replied:

“Although there is an unconscious editing process, the paint and surface dictate what appears. Chance marks and fractures, changes in colour, cracks and eroded layers all alter identity and significance.

“My work is very time consuming. There is very rarely just one layer. I can work into a piece for weeks, (sometime even years!) scratching, scraping, waxing, collaging even burning, destroying and re-building layers, put it to one side and return to it many times before I achieve the result I want.

“To answer your question, I don't have a specific process as such. I sometimes wish I had, it would make life so much easier, but perhaps make the work less interesting?”

You can see some of Bren’s latest work in the Lund Gallery in Easingwold, North Yorkshire and The South Street Gallery, Scarborough, where Bren is permanently exhibited as House artist.