Sax Impey 'Føroyar'

SAX IMPEY FØROYAR

Úr øllum ættum koma vindar, (From every quarter the winds come,)

og teir syngja um hav og land.”(and they sing of sea and land.)

Rasmus Effersøe, Úr øllum ættum koma vindar, (1886–1891)

Anima Mundi are delighted to present Føroyar, the latest solo exhibition from environmental

artist and mariner Sax Impey.

Impey’s practice is inseparable from direct encounter. Having sailed thousands of miles

across some of the earth’s most challenging waters, his work is informed not by distant

observation but by ongoing immersion in the elemental. The pieces gathered here emerge

from a recent voyage to the remote Faroe Islands, while also drawing upon wider experiences

of time spent at sea.

Here, the transient ocean meets with the geological, where rock is shaped and worn across

slow time. Cliffs and mountains rise like ancient sentinels — immovable and enduring, yet

our perception of this permanence remains fleeting, obscured and revealed by weather, mist

and shifting light. This continual dissolving and reforming creates a dialogue between the

momentary and the eternal.

Back in the studio, Impey translates these encounters into material form. His mark-making

experiments with fluidity, pressure and dissolution, carrying both the turbulence of weather

and wave and the weight of rock and mass. Fluid washes veil incisive gestures; immediacy

is held in balance with structural precision, in search of a language that might embody the

elemental in its many states.

Føroyar becomes a meditation on duality — of intimacy and immensity, transience and

endurance, fragility and strength. It is an invitation to enter into renewed dialogue with the

natural world, to sense again a deep and humbling connectedness with it, and to recognise

both the fleetingness of perception and the slower transformations of the earth that will

outlast us.

FØROYAR

Begin with the medium... a stick of charcoal, that most ancient of material... perhaps the

oldest, alongside ochre, the drawing mud of our forebears...

There is shape, and form to be discovered, the forms which sit massive, yet are made

elusive, and fragmentary through ethereal mists... rain clouds obscure, and give space to

ancient voices.

The strata, running horizontally throughout, perpendicular to runnels, cracks and crevices,

borne of the ceaseless water... the skeleton of the land, conjuring in the mind the mere hint

of a possibility of awareness, of the deep time of our planet home…

We see a pulse rate in geological deep time, the ossified heartbeat of the land... Land of mist

and cloud… no city in the world sees less sun than the tiny capital Tórshavn, where the Vikings

established their ting, and carved their optimistic sun dial on the flat rocks of Tinganes…

We have sailed to these islands onboard Excelsior, a gaff rigged Lowestoft fishing smack…

when these sailing vessels were superseded by newer, diesel engined boats in the British

fishing fleets, many found new homes further north, in Scandinavia and the Faroe Islands.

At every mooring we make, we are visited by singular old men, who sit and stare silently at

the vessel of their own working past, and the memory of their youth…

Sax Impey, 2025

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Føroyar

mixed media on panel, 122 x 180 cm

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Føroyar 2


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Føroyar 3


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Passage, N Atlantic 1

mixed media on paper, 17 x 25 cm

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Rain and Fog


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Moments of Light 1


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Moments of Light 2


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Moments of Light 3


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Moments of Light 4


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Moments of Light 5


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Moments of Light 6


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Klakkur


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Land of Mist and Cloud 1


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Sun Over the Fjord


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Kalsoy East


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Eysturoy


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Ridge


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Kambsenni Study 3


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Kambsenni

mixed media on canvas, 100 x 100 cm

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Kambsenni Study

mixed media on paper. 59 x 88 cm

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Stone and Water 1


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Stone and Water 2


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Klakkur 2


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Towards Klakkur

mixed media on panel. 91 x 122 cm

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Bones of the Land Study

bitumen on paper, 30 x 60 cm

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Cliff


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Edge Study


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Edge


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Eysturoy Study 1


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Eysturoy Study 2


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Eysturoy Study 3


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Eysturoy Study 4


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Eysturoy Study 5


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Eysturoy Study 6


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Kambsenni

charcoal on paper, 78 x 130 cm

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Above Fuglafjørður

charcoal on paper, 95 x 130 cm

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Selected Biography

Sax Impey is a British artist born in Penzance, Cornwall. He currently works from one of the

prestigious Porthmeor Studios in St. Ives. From 2005, he has collaborated with the crosscultural,

environmental art group Red Earth in the creation of site-specific installations

including a multi media performance at Trafalgar Square, London and Birling Gap in

Sussex. In 2007 Impey’s work was selected for the ‘Art Now Cornwall’ exhibition at Tate St

Ives where he was placed on the cover of the associated publication. The same year he was

heralded in The Times as one of the ‘New Faces of Cornish Art’. In 2010 he was featured in

Owen Sheers’s BBC4 Documentary ‘Art of the Sea (In Pictures)’ alongside Anish Kapoor,

J. M. W. Turner, Martin Parr and Maggi Hambling among others. His work was selected as

a finalist the 2013 Threadneedle Prize and the year before was elected an Academician at

the Royal West of England Academy. Most recently Impey was included in ‘The Rime Of

The Ancient Mariner : Big Read’ project alongside artists including Glenn Brown, Linder,

Cornelia Parker, Marina Abramović, Yinka Shonibare, Charles Avery, Gavin Turk, Fiona

Banner, Mark Dion, Derek Jarman, William Kentridge and John Akomfrah accompanied by

readings from renowned voices including Jeremy Irons, Willem Dafoe, Hilary Mantel, Simon

Armitage, Tilda Swinton, Iggy Pop, Marianne Faithfull, Alan Cumming, Rupert Everett and

Alan Bennett. Impey’s paintings are in multiple collections including The Arts Council,

Warwick University, the Connaught Hotel alongside other private collections worldwide.

Published by Anima Mundi to coincide with Sax Impey ‘Føroyar’

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system

or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or

otherwise without the prior permission of the publishers

Credits:

Portrait photograph 1 ©Claira Matheson

Portrait photograpth 2 © Jessie Stevens

Anima Mundi . Street-an-Pol . St. Ives . Cornwall . +44 (0)1736 793121 . mail@animamundigallery.com . www.animamundigallery.com

www.animamundigallery.com

Sax Impey 'Føroyar'

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