James Bartholomew | Mill House Gallery
Affordable Art Fair 2026
Following the success of Mill House Gallery’s debut at the Affordable Art Fair in 2025, the gallery will be returning to both London fairs this year. Firstly at Battersea (4th – 8th March 2026) and then at Hampstead (6th – 10th May 2026)
James has formed a collective with two longstanding artist friends, Ian Phillips and Norman Long, both of whom have links with Mill House Gallery going back many years.
Each artist takes a different approach to their chosen subject of landscape and seascape; from oil painting on canvas to woodcut to watercolour. Their passion for conveying a sense of place however, is evident throughout.
The three artists will all be on the stand for the duration of the shows so please come down to meet them.
If you would like free tickets to visit and meet the artists, please email Mill House Gallery.
About James Bartholomew RSMA
“I am fascinated by the interplay between a subject and light and how changing weather can alter the essence of something so completely.”
Background
Since 1992, James has worked as a contemporary landscape and seascape painter. He has a strong reputation within the British contemporary art market and his recognisable, ‘loose and energetic’ style has gained widespread acclaim. Strong light and colour are often central to James’ paintings and dynamic viewpoints are a feature in many.
About Norman Long MAFA
Norman Long (1976-) was born in Preston and received his BA from Newcastle University. Early-career awards, such as the de Laszlo Award (Royal Society of Portrait Painters) and Artist of the Year (Artist and Illustrators Magazine) established his reputation, firstly as a portrait painter and then gallery artist. In 2008 he was awarded a scholarship for Postgraduate study at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art.
Norman’s light-filled oils manifest his love for colour and a sensuous paint surface. He creates vibrant cityscapes and figurative compositions, capturing relationships between people in public spaces.
An enthusiastic member of The Northern Boys outdoor painting group, Norman loves working en plein air. For figurative works, he combines painting from life with observational drawings, invention, photography and memory to convey the veracity of life.
The New English Art Club have shown Norman’s work for the past six years. Along with countless solo shows, he has exhibited with the Royal Institute of Oil Painters, Royal Society of Portrait Painters, BP Portrait Award, Ruth Borchard Self Portrait Prize etc
Norman lives in Lytham St Annes, Lancashire, with his American wife Lindsey and three young boys. He loves to share his expertise with beginner painters and is the author of a popular book on Oil Painting technique. He is a trustee of the Manchester Academy of Fine Art and shows with Panter and Hall, London, Contemporary Six Gallery in Manchester and Hancock Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne.
About Ian Philips
My printing process today still starts with a walk and a sketchbook as it’s always done. Following lonely trails over empty hills, down twisting forests tracks, or along cliff side paths looking for complete compositions full of pattern, colour and texture. Catching the subtleties of weather and the natural drama of the landscape. These drawings are then taken back to the studio, enlarged and traced with brush and ink onto a sheet of Japanese tissue paper. This tissue is then stuck, face down, onto the block with rice paste glue and cut with a Hangito. Once cut away this block becomes the line ‘keyblock’ which its offset onto a number of other blocks for the different areas of the image.
This is when the process becomes all about pattern. The print may begin as a simple scribble in a sketchbook but as soon as you start on the blocks, the process becomes about gouging and cutting marks as well as, more recently with Tabi Hanga, using the organic marks and grain within the woodblock itself. These marks then help form a picture through creating pattern, texture and decoration.
