Louise Pilditch

Louise studied Fine Art at Exeter College of Art, Devon, and Tulsa University, Oklahoma where she graduated with a BFA in 1983, and an MA in Painting and Sculpture in 1985. She studied under Dr. Germaine Greer on her lively course “An Educated Eye”, which covered a wide range of topics including aesthetics and the Art Deco architecture of Tulsa. She was awarded a scholarship for her MA studies, working as a Teaching Assistant for Art Foundations and Sculpture at Tulsa University.

Louise taught life drawing, painting and drawing in Adult Education for nine years in Surrey and Hampshire and was Head of Art at a Preparatory school in Herefordshire for 19 years, all the while juggling family life, teaching and painting.

Pre-dawn starts in her studio have now evolved into full time painting. Louise is inspired to paint the wilder spectrum of landscapes. She has two strands to her landscapes, paintings inspired by UK landscapes and paintings inspired from her visits to Svalbard, Norway. Other sources of inspiration include news items, stories, museum and gallery visits and modern dance. Her latest solo exhibition was “Svalbard; Arctic Wilderness, Community and Polar Bears” in Mayfair, London, February 2015.

Recent group shows include h-Art The Garron Centre, Llangarron Sept.2015 and The Royal West of England Academy, Bristol, Autumn Show 2014. Her work is in private collections in the UK and Finland, in UNIS, The University Centre in Svalbard, Norway and The Elms School, Colwall, Hereford.

“Some of my earliest childhood memories involved mark making; scritching and scratching to embellish cracks in the walls, craftily done behind curtains to avoid immediate, unwelcome discovery and many hours spent sweeping patterns into the dust/mud/snow in the yard. Whispers of these actions resurface in the making of my paintings.”