Artist and explorer Tony Foster hopes his work moves people to protect planet

British artist and environmentalist Tony Foster has said he hopes his art can move audiences to better protect the environment.

The 79-year-old explorer is known for his extreme approach to creating large-scale watercolour paintings in some of the most remote parts of the world, which has led to near-death experiences including being charged by a bear.

For over 45 years, Foster has embarked by foot, on raft and canoe into the wilderness to paint on the top of mountains, the edge of canyons and even underwater, with a mission to bring awareness to environmental destruction and climate change and document the beauty of the natural world.

Tony Foster paints a waterfall (Schendel Films/PA)

His work has been captured in the film, Tony Foster: Painting At The Edge, to coincide with a major exhibition of his work at the Royal Watercolour Society titled Exploring Time: A Painter’s Perspective by Tony Foster.

Speaking about his work and the risk that involved to create it, Foster told the PA news agency: “It’s important for me because the work is all about absorbing yourself in these places and, in a way, bringing the evidence back to ‘civilisation’ so that people who don’t have the opportunity or the privilege of going to such places can actually see how extraordinary they are, and perhaps strengthen their resolve to protect them, because they’re all under threat one way or another.

“As soon as somebody finds a way of of making money out of these places, they’ll be destroyed, just as they are being as we speak and so it’s important that they’re documented.”

Over the course of his career he has been on 19 trips around the world including painting all three faces of Everest. On one occasion he spent 23 days in a single location in the restricted access area of the Grand Canyon to paint a 5x7ft canvas.

Tony Foster worked in many remote places (Schendel Films/PA)

He added: “I defy anybody who sees such things not to be an environmentalist.

“I hope that just by seeing my exhibitions, people will be moved to realise just how extraordinary these places are.”

The artist added that it is not “unusual” for people to “burst into tears” when looking at his paintings because of how moved they are by the work.

“If you can affect people in that way, just with some watercolour on a sheet of paper, then I think that’s worth doing,” he said.

“What I want people to take away from (the exhibition) is a sense of humility because it encompasses geological time. Billions or millions of years, all the way through to fleeting moments. And within that, the great sweep of our world’s history, human beings is just a tiny blip with nothing but a blip on the end of a gnat’s eyelash.

“I think if we realise that, perhaps we’d be a little less bumptious.”

Tony Foster Water Cuts Through Stone, Grand Canyon from Rim to River, 5800 feet_c12-14 Million Years, 2017 (Paul Mounsey/The Foster Museum/PA)

The documentary, released on November 14, uses archival footage, interviews and images of rarely seen locations in the world’s wilderness to retell his life story.

It also follows his final expeditions including an eight-day 100-mile canoe exploration of the Green River Wilderness to its confluence with the Colorado River in Utah – which was filmed entirely off-grid using solar power.

Director David Schendel described the artist as a “truly fearless painter” who would do anything to get to the right spot for his work.

He said: “Tony is showing us the beauty and if we forget the beauty, we’ll forget what we’re fighting for, because we live on the most beautiful planet, obviously, that we’ve ever discovered and may ever discover, and we’re very rapidly destroying it.

Tony Foster works on large-scale paintings (Schendel Films/PA)

“Tony is about capturing that beauty, bringing it back to us, showing it to us, and saying, ‘Don’t you think this is worth fighting for?’

“You can’t be a revolutionary unless you’re an optimist. You have to be optimistic and believe that you can change things and that we can save this planet. And Tony gives us the energy to do that. He gives us the reason behind it.

“I think that in some ways, that’s just as powerful, if not more powerful, than a direct action which I believe also there’s a place for because we are in kind of desperate times right now.

“We’re rapidly approaching a point in time when we won’t be able to reverse climate change.

“I think that Tony’s giving us an argument that is apolitical and can reach conservatives and liberals in the same way, and the idea that what we need to do now is come together as humanity to save what we have left of our planet and to move forward from there.

“So his message is very strong. It’s quiet, but it’s very strong.”

Tony Foster: Painting On The Edge premieres in cinemas on November 14 while the exhibition, Exploring Time: A Painter’s Perspective, will be running at the Royal Watercolour Society gallery in London until December 20.