Imogen Rigden’s exhibition Micro Seasons takes inspiration from the traditional Japanese calendar of seventy two micro seasons, known as Shichijūni kō (七十二候). Rather than dividing the year into four broad seasons, this ancient system breaks the natural cycle into subtle seasonal moments lasting only a few days.

Each micro season observes a small shift in the natural world. Ice begins to form on streams, butterflies appear in the spring air, or insects retreat underground as autumn approaches.

Rigden adopts this poetic framework as a way of observing the landscapes of northern Europe. Working with water soluble oils, she builds layered paintings that evoke atmosphere, movement and memory rather than literal description. Her works translate fleeting environmental changes into colour, texture and gesture.

Together the paintings form a quiet meditation on time, landscape and the subtle rhythms that shape the natural world.

The Work

Ice Thickens on Watercourses

 January 25 to January 29

44 × 34 cm

Japanese micro-season: Sawa mizu kōri tsumeru (沢水氷る)

Meaning: Water freezes on streams

This micro season marks a moment in deep winter when streams and watercourses begin to freeze. Movement slows across the landscape and the world feels suspended in quiet stillness.

Rigden’s painting captures this fragile threshold between motion and stillness. Pale tones and delicate textures suggest water gradually turning to ice while subtle shifts of colour hint at the current that continues beneath the frozen surface.

"This abstract painting comes from walks along the towpath of the Thames in late January. It's been cold enough for ice to form at the edges of the river. A heavy stone will crack the surface and I imagine the boom and creak of the ice beneath."

Butterflies Hatch and Join the Breeze

 April 30 to May 4

64 × 54 cm

Japanese micro-season: Chō hajimete shōzu (蝶始生)

Meaning: Butterflies begin to appear

This micro season celebrates the first butterflies emerging into the warming air of late spring. It signals a moment of renewal when the landscape begins to feel animated after winter.

Rigden interprets this moment through sweeping gestures and light tonal movement across the canvas. Colour drifts and disperses, echoing the delicate flight of butterflies carried on a soft spring breeze.

Soil Warms, Creatures Surface

May 10 to May 14

64 × 54 cm

Japanese micro-season: Mimizu izuru (蚯蚓出づる)

Meaning: Earthworms appear

This seasonal moment refers to the warming of the earth when worms and insects begin to emerge from the soil. It marks the quiet awakening of life beneath the ground and the growing vitality of spring.

Rigden’s painting reflects this transformation through layered earthy tones and shifting textures. The surface suggests the subtle energy building within the landscape as hidden life begins to stir beneath the soil.

"In May the Spring sunshine warms the soil and hibernating creatures begin their journey to the surface."

Buttercups Turn Meadows from Green to Gold

 May 21 to May 25

64 × 54 cm

Japanese micro-season: Kaiko okite kuwa o hamu (蚕起食桑)

Meaning: Silkworms begin eating mulberry leaves

In the traditional Japanese calendar this moment refers to the emergence of silkworms and the beginning of mulberry feeding, an important agricultural marker. Rigden adapts this seasonal moment to the northern European landscape.

In late spring buttercups bloom across meadows, transforming fields from green to shimmering gold. The painting reflects this luminous seasonal shift as colour spreads across the surface like sunlight over grass.

Great Rains Sometimes Fall

 August 3 to August 7

64 × 54 cm

Japanese micro-season: Taiu tokidoki furu (大雨時行)

Meaning: Great rains sometimes fall

This micro season describes the sudden heavy rains that arrive during late summer. The weather shifts dramatically as intense rainfall transforms the atmosphere and the landscape.

Rigden’s painting reflects the movement and energy of these seasonal storms. Fluid gestures and layered colour evoke rain sweeping across fields and skies heavy with gathering clouds.

Insects Hole Up Underground

 October 3 to October 7

64 × 54 cm

Japanese micro-season: Mushi kakurete to o fusagu (蟄虫坏戸)

Meaning: Insects hole up underground

This moment marks the transition into autumn when insects retreat underground as temperatures begin to fall. The visible life of the landscape slowly withdraws as nature prepares for winter.

Rigden interprets this seasonal turning inward through darker tones and quieter movement within the composition. The painting conveys the sense of the landscape closing down and holding its energy in reserve for the coming cold months.

"In mid Autumn life that thrived above ground in Summer continues to exist beneath the surface, in a world that we can only imagine. Creatures rest among the roots of sleeping plants."

Imogen Rigden is a contemporary painter whose work explores the rhythms of the natural world and the subtle shifts that occur within landscape over time. Working between Oxfordshire, the Highlands of Scotland and the coast of North Finistère in Brittany, her paintings arise from sustained observation of seasonal change and the atmospheric qualities of these environments.

Rigden was born and raised in Oxford in a family deeply connected to nature. Early experiences observing wildlife and woodland landscapes around the city instilled a lasting attentiveness to the behaviour of the natural world. These formative experiences developed into an enduring sensitivity to the cycles of nature, an awareness that continues to underpin her artistic practice.

Although her early academic studies focused on languages rather than art, Rigden’s painting developed gradually alongside a career in teaching and raising a family. Encouraged by friends, she began painting seriously later in life while travelling and spending time outdoors. As her work evolved she sought formal training to expand her understanding of contemporary art.

Rigden studied painting for a decade at Sunningwell School of Art, before undertaking contemporary art training at The Warehouse Art School in Oxford (2014–2016) and continuing her studies in contemporary painting at OVADA. During this period she explored sculpture, installation and printmaking alongside painting. These experiences continue to influence the layered and exploratory character of her work.

Rigden’s paintings emerge through an intuitive and physically engaged process. Surfaces are often disrupted with ink before layers of water soluble oil paint are applied, removed and reworked. Through this gradual process of construction and erasure the painting begins to evoke a particular moment experienced in the landscape. Rather than depicting specific locations, the works translate sensations of weather, light, sound and movement into colour, texture and gesture.

Underlying Rigden’s practice is a sustained interest in impermanence and the cyclical nature of the environment. Her paintings capture fleeting seasonal transitions and the quiet transformations that occur within natural ecosystems. In this respect her work sits within a long tradition of artists responding to the changing character of landscape. From the atmospheric studies of J.M.W. Turner to the expressive landscapes of Paul Nash and the seasonal observations of David Hockney, British artists have long sought ways to capture the passage of time within nature.

In this exhibition, Rigden’s paintings draw upon the Japanese calendar of seventy two micro seasons, a poetic system that divides the year into subtle five day intervals marking delicate shifts in the natural world. These seasonal moments provide a framework through which she reflects on the landscapes of northern Europe.

Rigden has exhibited widely in the United Kingdom, presenting both solo and group exhibitions across Oxfordshire, Cornwall and the Scottish Highlands. Her work is held in private collections in Britain, France, Canada and Australia.

She currently works from her Studios in Oxfordshire, while continuing to sketch and observe the landscapes that inform her work in woodland, coastal and remote environments.