Winter art show near Petworth

Gallery founder and director Elspeth Bray said: “I am often asked how I select my artists and truth to be told there is a lot of instinct in it. A painting must be beautifully crafted, but it must do more than represent. It needs to feed the soul, take us out of mundane daily life and appeal strongly to our visual and aesthetic senses. The artists in this show are all personal favourites.

“John Hitchens is a master, the equal of his more famous father Ivon.

"These large-scale works date from the 1970s and 80s when John was totally immersed in the West Sussex landscape. His sweeping broad, brush strokes, sense of rhythm, pattern and colour create works that sing of a landscape I know so well. Sarah Warley-Cummings’ paintings by contrast are small scale but evoke majestic vistas. Your eye soars over, fields, woods and trees flying up the ridges of the Downs. For their scale they have sensational impact.