A James Decent painting is essentially a study of light wearing a landscape as a disguise. Born in Sheffield in 1985 and raised on the boundary between city and the Peak District, he is drawn less to subject than to the way light falls across it, working most often on location to capture conditions that cannot be invented in a studio.
The result is a body of work that feels familiar and slightly suspended, contemporary in subject but timeless in atmosphere.
He works across oil, gouache, acrylic, and watercolour, moving fluidly between media depending on what a particular light demands, drawing on the techniques of John Singer Sargent, Joaquín Sorolla, and William Nicholson without imitating any of them directly. His training in architecture sharpened an eye for structure that surfaces occasionally in the work, though colour remains the dominant concern.
Decent studied architecture in Nottingham and London, winning prizes from the Worshipful Company of Chartered Architects and earning a nomination for the RIBA President's Medal. He remains a director of Decent Goodfellow Architects alongside his painting practice.
