THE CORNISHMAN, THUR 14 NOV 2002 'Might and Mystery' ( Landscapes of Cornwall and Wales).

It was just a year ago that gallery director Sue Marshall, after having managed the Mousehole Craft Shop for 11 years, realised her dream and was at last able to move into larger premises in the village, where she could mount exhibitions by individual artists, and opened her Sandpiper Gallery there.

To celebrate the success of her gallery's first year in business, Sue Marshall is presenting an exhibition of recent paintings ' Landscapes of Cornwall and Wales'by Peter Perry. An artist who could hardly be more local, and who lives and works'just up the hill' at Paul, he is largely self taught. He has, however, a distinct advantage in that he is a member of an artistic family - his mother is the well-known painter Biddy Picard - and has been among artists and their works for most of his life.

Since childhood he has done a great deal of drawing: an activity which has stood him in good stead, its presence is felt in the 50 or so works that make up his current show.

When young he also spent a considerable amount of time in the Snowdonia area of North Wales where, as he admits,'the grandeur of the mountain lndscape made a big impact on me'. Just how big an impact can be seen in the studies of the Welsh mountain country that he includes here.

On leaving school he completed a lengthy academic training, gaining a Batchelor of Science at the University of Newcastle, a Master of Science at the University of Sheffield and a Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Newcastle, all of which, in a sense, delayed his entry into the art world. He held his first solo show at the Penzance Arts Club four years ago. A 'persistant painter', he has enjoyed several other solo shows, only recently his one-man show at the Carlyle Gallery in London met with acclaim, and has been part of mixed exhibitions from the Albany Gallery, Cardiff to the Artifex Gallery, Sutton Coldfield. For the past two years he has had paintings selected for hanging at the Royal Academy Summer Show, and his work already forms part of private collections in this country and abroad.

Since university much of his working life has been spent in the great outdors and it comes as no surpise that inspiration for his paintings should spring from the landscape and the natural world.

From impressions of his native Cornwall, St Buryan to Bodmin Moor, to those of mountainous Wales his compositions are concerned with the atmosphere of a place - the light and sky, earth and water. He says 'I particularly enjoy painting skies. A very important part of the landscape, they have a powerful effect on the emotional tone of a painting'.

He is also fond of painting at night and the combination of his subfusc colour range and subtle approach increases the sense of isolation of detachment in his nocturnal studies, adding enormously to their appeal.

....Whether exploring the mystery of Cornwall or the might of Wales - I have said this before about his paintings and I've no hesitation in saying it again - there is an amalgam of strength and sincerity in them which is as reassuring as it is real and rich.