Vicki was born in 1970 in the village of East Boldre, New Forest, and grew up with a deep love of nature. Living by the Solent, her paintings stem from local landscape and seascape; a keen naturalist, hence birds and animals often feature in the compositions. Vicki enjoys a variety of genres, and her style of oil painting is influenced by artists including Balthus, Stanley Spencer, Frida Kahlo, Chagall, Van Gogh, Bonnard and Piero della Francesca.
Autobiography is a recurrent theme in Vicki's work. She depicts a female figure as an 'alter ego', not strictly a self portrait, but a young woman inhabiting imagined scenarios, with pets and other animals for company and reassurance. As a sufferer of mental health difficulties, painting has been a constant in Vicki's life, a source of strength, and a way of interpreting the world.
Vicki studied fine art at Byam Shaw School of Art, London, and Solent University, Southampton, graduating in 1995. Her style of painting was described as 'naive yet sophisticated' by her tutors, drawing on surrealist and expressionist art, always seeking a balance between reality, imagination and romanticism.
Exhibiting
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