About My Work
My journey as an artist has been one of rediscovery. Creativity was always part of my life, from childhood when my father, car artist Ralph Hobbs taught me the discipline of drawing with precision and care. Though I pursued Art & Design during my A-levels and had considered a career in theatre set design, life carried me in a completely different direction into the then emerging world of data networks and the internet. While it's fair to say I was fortunate to enjoy a successful career in the industry, the impulse to create art never fully left me with the occasional weekend project, and it resurfaced powerfully during the Covid-19 lockdowns.
With unexpected time on my hands, I found myself compelled to paint. Working on large canvases in acrylics, I drew on the scale and energy of my theatrical background to produce over 30 large scale works. Very much influenced by David Hockney, a then hero of mine, these paintings were full of visual immediacy, vibrant 'out of the tube' colour, and expressive freedom, culminating in my debut London exhibition HobbART Unleashed. It was as though 30 years of art had exploded from me and that body of work became a turning point, convincing me that painting was not just a side-line but should become an essential part of my life.
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Encouraged by professional artist older sister I moved from the immediacy of acrylics into the more layered, deliberate medium of oils. This shift coincided with online studies at the New Masters Academy, where I was introduced to the teaching of the impressionist painters of American Impressionism. Here I discovered the work of Aldro T. Hibbard, Emile Gruppe, and the early Rockport painters, artists whose handling of atmosphere, brushwork, and seasonal light felt like an awakening, and whose legacy continues to resonate strongly with me.
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My recent work focuses on the landscapes of Hertfordshire, particularly surrounding the village of Pirton where I live. These are places I know well, but through painting I aim to see them afresh, their shifting light, seasonal changes, and the quiet poetry of familiar fields, woods, and skies.
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What drives me now is the desire to create paintings that sit within an impressionist tradition, while also carrying a contemporary vibrancy and energy. I want the viewer to feel both the calm of the landscape and the vitality of its colours and movement, the sense that nature is alive, dynamic, and full of presence.
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Mark R Hobbs.
(Mark is a member of
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and The Rockport Art Association & Museum)
