This year my fellow artist, Patsy Jones and I, hope to see you in person, COVID restrictions willing, at Patsy's house in Wantage for our outside exhibition showing recent paintings and prints on a variety of subject matter, local landscapes and some scenes from further afield. Pictures will be displayed under an awning (with/without sides depending on the weather), others in the front of the garage and some in a changing window display, with plenty of fresh air, sanitiser and wipes to hand. Please be prepared to keep socially distanced, wear masks if required/possible etc following the relevant guidelines at the time. There will be some chairs to sit and wait should another 'household' be browsing when you arrive. We will have a card machine should anything large or small take your fancy from cards to prints to originals. If you wish to see something but cannot make the listed opening days/times please contact me to discuss whether it would be possible to arrange an alternative.
At other times of the year I exhibit as a member with Lechlade, Wantage and Faringdon Art groups and hope that their annual exhibitions, which usually run in Aug, Sep/Oct and Oct/Nov respectively, will be able to take place 'in the flesh' this year rather than having to go online again. Details of dates and times will be posted on the exhibitions page on my website at https://www.jillsmithart.co.uk and via social media links as available.
Hello, I am a painter based in the Vale of the White Horse, Oxfordshire. I work in watercolour, oil and acrylic media, the choice of which depends on the subject matter, whether painting inside in the 'studio' (read spare bedroom) or outside, or what I feel like using at the time. My first love is watercolour but recently I have been working more in oil and acrylic. Occasionally I also do some hand-printing using the reduction linocut technique.
I am mostly 'self-taught' through attending evening classes, art group demonstrations and workshops, reading books and watching DVDs (I have an 'O-level' in art for those of you old enough to know what one of them is). Painting is an itch that has always needed to be scratched. At school I often sketched and doodled things seen out of the classroom window if I got bored. This bad habit continued during some university science lectures I'm afraid and now, after a career in corrosion chemistry followed by IT networking, I have the time to put painting first.
I am always drawn to painting water in some form or another; seas, rivers, lakes, waterfalls. I also try to capture those glorious fleeting light effects that make you stop and stare and which somehow always seem to be best viewed from in the middle of a busy road or spotted when you can't stop to paint and don't have the right camera to hand to capture a decent photo.
My landscapes, flower studies and pet portraits are mostly realistic in style but from time to time I let rip, splash paint about, see what happens, and then pull it into some sort of image, a bit like imagining you see things when looking into the flames of a fire. Sometimes I add calligraphy (a very loose definition the way I do it) into the painting not always in a legible way, more as a texture effect that comes from the words and letter forms.
if you like the examples of my work in this profile, please visit my website at https://www.jillsmithart.co.uk to see more in the various galleries. There is also my online shop for some originals, reproduction and hand-printed prints, and cards. If you are interested in purchasing anything or want further information or to commission something, please contact me through the website links or my Facebook and Instagram pages.