Muswell Hill artist Susan Rosenberg gets with the flow in show of watercolours at the Millinery Works gallery

Published: 26th November, 2010
by JAMIE WELHAM

THINK of it as a mental holiday from London: a place where the water doesn’t just flow down the sinkhole and the sky is for ever ablaze with golden colours. 

This is the watery sub-world imagined on canvas by Muswell Hill artist Susan Rosenberg, who opened a new exhibition of her paintings at the Millinery Works gallery in Islington this week.

The artist, who has lived in north London for more than 20 years, said she wanted to capture the “tension of opposites” that gives water its unique property – being both fluid and solid to the eye at the same time.

“I didn’t set out to paint water, it just evolved from a few paintings I started a ­couple of years ago,” she said. “I got interested in how water changes everything around you. The light catches it, it never looks the same and that is a real challenge for an artist.” 

Her works, a mixture of acrylic and watercolours, are influenced by her extensive travels.

Sharp-eyed observers will spot Venice, the Dolomites, California and her native South Africa in the canals, waterfalls and mountain lakes, although she stresses they are meant to be fleeting rather than directly representational. 

It is the sixth time Ms Rosenberg has exhibited at the gallery.

• Water by Susan Rosenberg runs until December 23 at the Millinery Works Gallery, 87 Southgate Road, N1. For further details visit www.millineryworks.co.uk