Born in 1977, Fergus studied at Camberwell College of Arts for Foundation and then at Norwich School of Art for his degree. He worked as an art handler and picture hanger in London, and then as an artist’s assistant and technician when he moved to Brighton in 2010.
For many years Fergus was painting mainly landscape based work, working mostly outdoors in oil paint. Later he started to make charcoal drawings of the moon from a telescope, somewhat inspired by Galileo’s drawings, and his long running passion for the Moon and Space. These drawings of the moon were exhibited twice in the UK, in Athens and Munich and and were featured in Astronomy Magazine. They are also discussed in the book Moon: Art, Science and Culture by Alexandra Loske and Robert Massey.
In Brighton Fergus’ work was shown alongside one of Constable’s paintings in the Brighton Museum and he is frequently mentioned in lectures on Contemporary British Romanticism and the Moon in art. Similarly to the Moon, in its embodiment of the collective, shared experience, Fergus has continued to explore this idea in his latest Crowd Studies series. In many ways it is this Romanticism that makes Fergus' work so compelling. Suspended in thought and time, Fergus' paintings appear lost in a moment whilst rooted in human experience and consciousness. The effect is deeply thought-provoking.
Occupying the space between the familiar and the unknown, there is a romance and a mystery to his work, a feeling left slightly out of reach. With this refusal to be pinned down, the viewer is given the freedom to make their own conclusions, to dwell in their own associations and memories. Drawn into their anonymous, ambiguous worlds, Fergus' paintings become intensely relatable and entirely personal, in a way that is both universal and quietly mesmerising.
Fergus explains, "In my paintings I'm interested in all the variables that come together in an often mundane moment - the people, the colours, the shapes. Identity, time and place aren't important to me, but rather that these figures are captured and given unity by a single event. I often like to leave faces free from detail and try instead to give them personality and character through their form and clothing. This allows an ambiguity, for questions to be asked: questions that I might not be able to answer. For me these are, to some degree, dreams: an alternate reality in a turning world, fleshed out through painting, and not necessarily something real. Mystery will always outlast explanation.”
From 2015-2023 Fergus was represented by New Art Projects in London and exhibited with them nationally and internationally. In 2022 the gallery published a book of his work with an essay by Jenny Uglow. We have shown Fergus Hare's work at GrandyArt since 2022. It has been a great privilege to exhibit Fergus' paintings and to spend time with this deep-thinking and immensely talented British artist.