A tribute to mallard conservation

Mike Montgomery meets this year’s BASC Wildlife Fund stamp artist Peter Partington.

This year’s stamp artist is Peter Partington, a Suffolk-based member of the Society of Wildlife Artists. Now 83, he has enjoyed a long and distinguished career as an artist and illustrator of the world of nature.

He has had numerous exhibitions in Britain and abroad and has written and illustrated many books and magazines on art, drawing wildlife and the countryside. He has also participated in worldwide art and conservation projects.

The brief behind the BASC Wildlife Fund (BWF) commission this year was to celebrate the long-standing and important contribution that wildfowlers make to conservation in the UK. The subject chosen was duck nesting tubes, which have greatly increased the breeding success of mallard around the country.

Peter has previously painted a picture of white-fronted geese for the BWF’s forerunner, the Wildlife Habitat Trust, for the wildlife stamp in 2009. He paints in a variety of styles, including the contemporary impressionistic approach used for the BWF commission.

Peter said: “I have been obsessed with birds and wildlife since my teens. Being out in the landscape with pencil, sketchbook and paints recording the power of wild nature is a joy. I have been lucky to have travelled widely. I’ve seen toucans in the Costa Rican rain forest, tigers on their reserves in India, the vast migrations of godwits in New Zealand and the wildebeest in Kenya.

“Living and working in glorious Suffolk for 30 years has been a major influence on my art. The birds, animals, rural spaces and wide estuaries are a never-ending source of inspiration.

“I make lightning notes in the field and take them back to the studio to explore these in a variety of styles. I love watercolour, but am always experimenting with painting in oils and printmaking. My style can vary from small sketches to bigger watercolours and larger oil paintings. Subjects include classic species such as red deer, peregrine falcon and the elegant barn owl. In my compositions, I try to capture their movement, their changing colours, the light, weather and the landscape that they inhabit.

“I am now working on a major book about the birds of Suffolk. “I used to do a little shooting as a young man, but now I just like to watch and draw the wildlife around me.”