His work invites viewers on a journey of discovery, where each painting provides a multidimensional experience. A journey in which Sibthorp remains immersed: the study of the human figure and dance in all its forms.
Fletcher Sibthorp (UK, 1967) is one of the most sought-after British artists today. Primarily known for his figurative works, much of his paintings reside in private and corporate collections in England and Japan, the two places that have most frequently enjoyed his numerous exhibitions. In his successful career, he has already starred in twenty solo exhibitions and participated in joint shows and art fairs, which have, for example, taken him to New York twice.
It is precisely on the east coast of the United States where Fletcher Sibthorp has garnered the highest recognition from art critics, collectors, and fellow professionals.
Indeed, we are facing one of the most successful painters in the world’s most important competition. Since winning the ARC (Art Renewal Centre) Salon in three categories in 2014: Best Nude, Chairmans Choice Award, and Honorable Mention in the Figurative Category Award, he has been a finalist on six other occasions. A contest whose main prize was awarded in 2023 to a work by Mark R. Pugh, also an honorable member of the Tartget jury.
Sibthorp’s career had an ideal launchpad since he graduated with honors from Kingston University. He was 22 years old, and a few decades later, he can boast of being one of the artists who best represented the elegance of classical dance or the energy and racial feeling of flamenco. From his palette and brushes have emerged the powerful figures of the Royal Ballet’s Darcey Bussell, Sarah Lamb, Miyako Yoshida, and Alina Cojocaru, or the flamenco artists Joaquín Cortés, Eva Yerbabuena, and Sara Baras.
Influenced by painters like Francis Bacon and Frank Auerbach, as well as artists of the caliber of Gustav Klimt and Edgar Degas, Sibthorp equally admires his colleagues Rise Art, Nick Offer, Zin Lim, or Daisy Cook. His observation, absorption capacity, and creative intelligence have bequeathed an extraordinary painter capable of merging traditional oil painting methods with expressive abstract markings and textures, embodying a captivating blend of the familiar and the unexpected. The result is paintings laden with mystery, genuine narratives that refine classical geometry and naturalistic ideals.
Sibthorp says “For me, the process of creativity is the search for the divine; not in a religious sense but trying to discover a doorway where life experience becomes more than the sum of its parts and to touch that part beyond existence through painting; to draw the viewer into that otherworld if only for a second.”
