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Leicester Special Collections

A full-time painter

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'Barn Owl', oil on board, c. 2006, from exhibition catalogue for 'Reg Cartwright: New Paintings' at Cambridge Contemporary Art, September 2006, RAC/10.  ©Reg Cartwright.

'The simpler the piece, the more difficult it is.'*

*Reg Cartwright talking to Clare Barry in 'The simple touch' from Artists & Illustrators, (July 2009), p. 93, RAC/13.

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'Estuary Still Life', oil on board, undated, from exhibition catalogue for 'Reg Cartwright: New Paintings' at Cambridge Contemporary Art, 19 September - 11 October 2009.  ©Reg Cartwright.

At the age of 65, Reg decided to give up illustration and become a full-time painter. 

'We spent holidays in Suffolk and I began painting there as well as in Leicestershire.  It was all sea, mud flats, sheds and boats and I thought, “I can have some fun with this”.  I like to interpret what I see in front of me and capture the essence of it … I work in my studio most days, nine until five, even at weekends, because I love it.  I guess you could say I’m obsessive, because even if I didn’t earn money painting, I’d still paint.'*

*Reg Cartwright talking to Joan Stephens from: ‘The Story Evolves’ in Leicestershire and Rutland Life, (October 2009), p. 121, RAC/13

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'Still Life - East Coast Window', oil on board, 2003, from exhibition catalogue for 'Reg Cartwright: New Paintings' at Cambridge Contemporary Art, October 2003, RAC/10.  ©Reg Cartwright.

'Cartwright shows how by paring down everyday objects like fruit, jugs, plates, spoons, fish and landscape one can achieve an effect of startling simplicity and beauty, where colour, form and composition come together in harmony and intensity.'*

*Exhibition catalogue for 'Reg Cartwright: New Paintings' at Cambridge Contemporary Art, October 2003, p. 1, RAC/10.