Robinson Annie

Annie Robinson was born in Belfast in 1961 and moved to the Untied States in 1973. Annie is the daughter of Markey Robinson and is influenced by his work while developing her own style. Like Markey, Annie works from her imagination and paints romantic views of rural Ireland in strong vibrant colours.Annie spent her childhood travelling the Irish countryside with her father as he captured it's life and charm that have made him world-renowned. During these travels Annie fell in love with the simple rural life of the Irish countryside with its serene fishing villages and cottages so avidly captured in her father's art. These early childhood memories became the basis for much of her art in later life.At the age of twelve Annie emigrated to America with her mother and sister. Annie went on to study at the University of Washington in Seattle where she took part-time art classes at the Cornish Art School. She graduated with a degree in Nursing from the University of Washington and for the next 18 years of her life Annie travelled all over the United States and abroad to the Pacific Islands and to Australia and New Zealand. Annie eventually settled in Hawaii where she was to remain for the next seven years. While working as a nurse in Hawaii, she painted scenes of rural Polynesian life in her spare time.Annie had not forgotten Ireland, though, and from the age of 18 onwards made frequent visits to see her mother and sister who had moved back from America. By her late twenties her visits to Ireland became more and more frequent and at twenty eight Annie had firmly re-established her relationship with her estranged father. Her reconciliation with Markey also marks the point at which Annie became a full-time painter. Her work took on more and more of an Irish theme featuring the cottages and seascapes that Annie had witnessed in her childhood, as well as mythical Irish figures.In a strange way my father and I were drawn to life and art in similar ways. I think the joy and romance of a moment of life was the same for both of us and that is what we try to communicate as artists.For her landscapes Annie works solely from her imagination, drawing upon her childhood experience of a simpler rural Ireland, and for her floral still lifes she likes to have fresh flowers around her for inspiration. As well as her father, Annie names Van Gogh and Gauguin as influences and Dan O'Neill and Nora McGuiness as her favourite Irish Artists. Her works contain the same flat plains of un-modulated colour so characteristic of her father's works, but in Annie's works the sombre, muted earth tones of Markey are replaced with a more vivid, vibrant palette. Although both Markey and Annie share a nostalgic and idealistic view of rural Ireland , Markey's landscapes have a sense of sadness and regret and a disconnection from the modern world whereas Annie's works are a joyous celebration of rural Irish life, inviting the viewer to partake in that joy. This celebration of a simpler life is something that Annie finds very important in the current economic climate. As a way to combat the recession she recommends trading in the busy, stressful, urban life and in her own words getting a cottage with chickens and a goat and cutting some peat.

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