Michael Taylor: New paintings at Nancy Sever Gallery, Gorman Arts Centre

After more than three years at her initial venue at the Kingston shops, Nancy Sever has shifted her commercial art gallery to the Gorman Arts Centre in Braddon, where she has taken up a two-year lease. It appears to be smaller in display area in terms of wall length, but more spacious, considerably cheaper to rent, and within an arts hub with greater visitation numbers than at Kingston.

The inaugural show at the new venue is a selection of 14 new oil paintings by Michael Taylor, who has shown with her on several previous occasions. Taylor is a marvellous veteran expressionist painter, who, if anything, has improved with age. His sense of touch has remained assured, the gestural qualities are free and bold, while the palette is brilliant, vibrant and colour-saturated.

Taylor frequently works on a high key colour ground, quite often pink primer, on top of which a composition is developed with vigorous brushstrokes and pertaining to a recognisable seascape or landscape. Glimpses of pink are allowed to shine through so there is a general airiness, looseness and spatial depth. On the very top layer, he allows dribbles of paint to run down the canvas, in a sense stressing the two-dimensional flatness of the picture plain.

To add to the richness of colour reflexes, Taylor will occasionally employ an oil stick to produce colourful dabs, like little pockets of energy. The whole canvas pulsates with a vibrant intensity and ambiguous spatial constructions as the eye is seduced by the moody blues, crisp shapes and soft melting masses of colour. Although there is a hypnotic intensity, everything also seems to be in a state of flux with difficulty in focusing on a single spot in the painting. Taylor enjoys an emotional overload in his paintings and a play with moods.

The key painting in this exhibition is Tathra (2017), quite a large oil painting – 120 centimetres by 160 centimetres – where the composition is built around a central void that anchors the painting, while colour masses whirl and float around this vortex. In terms of its colour reflexes, it is a complex and sophisticated painting, yet on first encounter there is a freshness, spontaneity and immediacy. The more you examine the painting, the richer and more seductive it becomes, it is a wonderful viewing experience.

The other major painting in the show is Sea swell (2017), of more modest dimensions (122 centimetres by 96 centimetres), where lyricism and drama are allowed to co-exist. Very few artists have the sophistication of Taylor to create such a dramatic abstracted composition, yet to flirt with figurative forms. The crumbly, bold dashes of oil stick add to the variety of surface textures and heighten the impact of the picture.

Although Taylor has been exhibiting for more than half a century, unlike many artists with a romantic temperament who quickly start to mimic their youthful enthusiasm, his artistic vision continues to grow in intensity and profundity.