Rob McLeod

b.1948

Diploma of Art: The Glasgow School of Art

Oil on plywood

Nasty Surprise No 1

In Rob McLeod’s Nasty Surprise No 1, the young woman stands awkwardly flat-footed, her head askance, faceless and depersonalised. Comically sinister figures spiral around her. Over her head hovers a big disembodied hand, which seems about to reach down and grab her. Take a second look though, and that hand seems more like a giant pink spider, with tiny eyes peering out between the contracted fingers.

Essay

Dimensions: 620x2215mm

Oil on plywood

Small Painter

Even at their most abstract, Rob McLeod’s paintings are always in the process of becoming something, of taking on new forms and energies. Small Painter is at the end of that cycle. A cartoon-like hand holding a real paintbrush emerges from a writhing mass of organic forms. This figurative element challenges the viewer to see a body or a set of energies embedded in these brightly coloured, interconnected shapes.

Essay

Dimensions: 690x1710mm