6 OCTOBER 2007, Page 44

Water falling, rippling, bubbling, breaking on roc

Water falling, rippling, bubbling, breaking on rocks or trapping layers of light in its depths is the focus of Christian Wharton's exhibition at Cattura Fine Art, Harlequin Centre, Exeter (until 22 November). A 20-year obsession with the subject has taken the artist from the falls of Nevis to the wild waters of Bhutan's Upper Paro River, but it's Black Moss Pot, a pool on Langstrath Beck in Borrowdale, that has inspired much of the work in this show. Wharton's watercolours are anything but wishy-washy: her handground pigments on rough-grained paper are as rich as oils, and her mature technique — she turned 70 this year — is as transparent, and dazzling, as the element she paints.

(See 'Swimmer on her Back', above.) LG