Burnley

Location

Country: UK
City: London
Place: Government Art Collection

At the start of the twentieth century, Burnley was a busy coal mining centre and a prosperous industrial town at the heart of Britain’s textile industry in Lancashire. The town faced huge challenges as both coal mining and textile manufacturing began to wind down. By the end of the twentieth century, the town, like others in the north, had become a hugely deprived area. More recently new regeneration schemes led to it being declared Britain's most enterprising area in 2013. This painting by Kinnear captures a warmth and energy in an ordinary residential area of the town, through his application of paint depicting light and colour. The built environment he chooses to paint is immediately recognisable as that of a post-industrial town in the north of Britain.

Martin Kinnear was born in 1969 in Lancashire where he was brought up. He is a self-taught artist who after a stroke in 2004, that left him paralysed on his left side, changed his mode of painting to emphasise ‘the experiential and possible, over …observational painting’. He was awarded the silver medal at the Societé Nationale des Beaux Arts Salon, Paris and a solo exhibition of his work was held at The Bowes Museum in 2020. Kinnear currently lives and works in Yorkshire.

Places

Burnley

Subjects

landscape C21st, industrial, urban, bin, street, terraced house, chimney

Materials & Techniques

canvas, oil, oil paint, oil painting

Artist

Martin Kinnear (1969 - )

Title

Burnley

Date

2019

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

height: 97.3 cm; width: 127.4 cm; depth: 5.3 cm

Acquisition

Presented by the artist to 10 Downing Street

Inscription

recto: inscribed by the artist 'KINNEAR', bottom right

Provenance

Gift of the artist to UK Government Art Collection on behalf of 10 Downing Street, 12 September 2020

GAC number

18873