Uli Biaho Tower, Karakoram

John Altringham

A watercolour inspired by an image made in 1909 by the pioneering mountain photographer Vittorio Sella. I started painting a few years ago, most often mountains and coasts familiar to me in the British Isles. The constraints of the pandemic brought more time for painting but deprived me of subjects. I turned to ranges like the Cascades, from a time long ago when I lived in Seattle, but the inspiration provided by my old 35mm slides soon dried up. During lockdown I rediscovered the work of Sella–bought a book of his photographs and trawled the internet for more. His large format glass plate photographs are extraordinarily detailed and interpreting them through watercolours was an irresistible challenge.

As an ecologist and conservation scientist I am acutely aware of my contribution to climate change and biodiversity loss. To tread more lightly on the Earth, I gave up flying shortly before I retired—and before I started painting. However, I can travel in books and on the internet relatively lightly. The world’s mountains are still open to me, even though I’ve decided not to visit them again.

I’ve always needed to understand something of the landscapes I visit—the geology, geomorphology, ecology, history. Understanding something of how a mountain was created helps me paint it and looking hard at a mountain to paint it helps reveal its structure. It’s an immersive two-way process. Art is often slow and contemplative, so I have time to think about the mountains I paint and about mountains more generally. Art facilitates and enriches memories of past adventures and leads to new, virtual mountain trips. Sometimes imaginary mountains emerge—but they are never as improbably unrestrained as Uli Biaho.

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