Sam Cartman is fascinated by the countryside of Dumfries and Galloway, particularly the raw moors and glens around Thornhill – Cample Woods and the Forest of Ae.

Areas like these are mainly free of the intervention of humans, with little farming and certainly no romantic cultivation of ideal landscapes.

Their very emptiness appeals to his search for the abstract qualities of the place, vistas he can catch with a spread of his knife across the canvas with small notes of colour in the texture of cliffs and pathways or dark streaks of a glowering sky.

These paintings truly catch that sense of place, a place for contemplation, reflection, escape from the current stresses of city life.