Learning Painting

Iona Gordon: In terms of what my university had to offer, I was able to freely explore different mediums outside of the fine art department which has made my artistic practice very diverse - as well as painting, I write, take photographs on film and sometimes I video tape.

Bunny Hennessey: I feel so lucky to have studied at City & Guilds, from the studio spaces to the close group of friends I made there. But above all it was the tutors’ time and care that really pushed me. I feel that they unlocked something and helped me discover why and how I paint. It’s having that mix of encouragement and deep questioning that has helped me beyond anything I could achieve on my own.

Jack Woolley: When I arrived at art school I thought art was about the visual representation of my surroundings. This quickly changed as teachers and fellow students exposed me to many different approaches – whether it was experimental mark making workshops, the study of movements like Arte Povera, or the revelation that art can be used to examine socio-political themes.

Cain Casson: The house I’m in right now has become a makeshift studio; what used to be a living room I’m turning into a space for painting and outside there's a space that's become storage for found wood and other things I use to make frames and stretchers. With this setup, my practice is split into two halves, one which I try to keep tidy and focused and one which is rough and free form, with elements of each bleeding into the other.

Danni Jo Barker: Throughout my studies I have utilised spaces available to me at university. Although I have a small studio at home, I work best in places where I am not fully in control of the environment. Unexpected happenings and conversations with others give me useful insight into where my work can go next. I often paint or draw in pubs, cafes or parks. This also helps me keep my working practice clean - left to my own devices, I can lose direction. Embracing different human and material connections keeps me on my toes and in tune with possibilities. Wherever I work is a little messy - overlapping ideas leads to new things. 

Liz Omotosho: My studio felt like a second home to me...  I had my own little corner where I’d spend countless hours working, watching movies, sometimes even eating dinner or taking naps. I especially enjoyed watching others work in the studio; seeing everyone so focused and engaged always inspired me to keep pushing forward. I treated that space as if it were essential to my life. My tutors felt like second parents to me, and being around them reminded me of home in Leicester. Leeds Beckett University always made me feel safe and supported, it will forever hold a special place in my heart. 

Mariam Alsaadi: My studio is unconventional in the sense that it’s not a large space. I have a desk in which I spent most of my time looking through sketch books and photographs to make thumbnail sketches... Although simple I have come to find that my studio set up is what provokes me most. Around my studio space I like to keep both completed and unfinished works around me so that I can move from one painting to another as I desire. 

Nahraine Al-Khafaji: My studio acts as a centre for my external research. It’s in a corner where I've divided the smaller wall for studies, charcoal drawings and  sketchbook studies with image references scattered all over the wall. There are drilled  shelves, displaying ceramic shards and vessels which I draw inspiration from. The  larger wall is reserved for my final and larger works. I often allow the smaller, more  experimental corner of the wall to inform what’ll unfold on the bigger canvas. My desk is cluttered with stacked books, brushes, and tubes of paint. It almost boxes me  in, but in a way that helps me stay immersed and focused. Looking back, I enjoyed  working closely with peers in a shared studio setting. I found that environment  encouraged a lot of critical dialogue, reflection and development. It was one of the most  formative aspects of my undergraduate degree.

Ruby Cascarina: My studio space has a strong sense of community. Sharing a space with other artists is incredibly valuable as it gives me the opportunity to receive feedback and understand the ways that other people interpret my work. As my practice develops (and I have started to increase the scale of my paintings) I have had to adapt and compromise with the artists around me. Because my painting process starts with the canvases laying flat, oftentimes I work outside of my studio space in more unconventional areas of the communal studios. In doing so, I interact with people that otherwise would not see the work, sparking interesting conversations and new perspectives. 

Bunny Hennessey: I remember a tutor very early on in our introductory life drawing that noticed how I was drawing and suggested that I didn’t have to just draw as I saw the body, that I could abstract the form. It was the first time I felt I had permission to approach my practice in this way, something that feels invaluable now. 

Unica Yabiku: Since my time and conversations at Camberwell, one idea that has stayed with me is the distinction between the surface and the space frame, and how one might creatively navigate the boundaries between the two. Viewing a painting as something that either pushes outward from the surface or pulls inward from the canvas has become a simple yet essential concept in my practice. 

Cain Casson: When I started uni I didn’t give much thought to collaboration, but as my approach has become more refined, I’ve been seeking out more opportunities to do so. To balance out the solitary nature of painting I’ve become more collaborative in the before and after stages. When making frames or thinking about other expanded methods of display, it’s been really rewarding to work with sculptors; trading practical skills and approaches.

Ali Cook: I try to engage with yin and yang when I'm painting, in the hopes that a wholeness unfolds throughout doing this and that somewhere in between these extremes of being there is peace to be found for each of us.

Iona Gordon: The most predominant theme I have been imbedding in all my works (painting, photography and video) is community. 

Bunny Hennessey: When I paint I’m thinking about painting the body as something we inhabit and experience, rather than it being a physical object we look at. I’m interested in embodied sensations and if emotions can be described with colour and liquidity. To me the body is a failed container of how we feel, and I want to challenge the canvas to store this in a more stable way. 

Anugrah Mishra: Broadly, I explore themes of wellness, sickness, connection and care. I make connections between humans and the non-human in an effort to interrogate capitalist notions of wellbeing. This means I’m also very interested in themes surrounding labour, rest, addiction and generally how all of these things play out on our bodyminds.

Denny Kaulbach: In my practice, I explore the global refugee crisis through the lens of psychoanalysis, delving into the psychological and emotional dimensions of displacement, trauma, and identity. By examining this crisis from a psychoanalytic perspective, I seek to uncover the deeper, often unseen, impact that forced migration has on individuals and communities. As an artist, I translate these complexities into visual form through my paintings. 

Varshga Premarasa: I investigate themes of memory, hidden narratives, and reimagined spaces that reveal a distorted reality. My work often embraces disturbing stories, uncovering the complexities of personal and collective histories, illustrating how memories can be altered over time. Through surreal and nonsensical narratives, I challenge viewers’ perceptions, inviting them to engage with deeper, often hidden meanings in my art. 

Benedict Robinson: Over the last 18 months a lot of my work has been about nostalgia and recreating lost things from my childhood and adolescence. I collate images from games, TV programmes, screen shots and books, to create imagined environments from this time, storylines, and collages of a lost analogue digital world​​.

Parker White: The themes I explore is the celebration of Black representation. I am passionate about giving people of colour a chance to see themselves in the galleries and exhibitions. I want to make a difference, it’s important to me to allow someone else to relate to my work, just as much I felt there was a lack in representation when I was growing up.

Shannon Ward: In my practice I investigate the ways one can portray the transmasculine body in the context of art history. I do this through appropriating paintings that are reclaimed by the queer gaze, or paintings that heavily sexualise the female form. 

Jack Woolley: I was brought up in a predominantly white community that was in denial about the legacy of British imperialism. The gulf between what I was taught and the reality revealed by artists and writers like Yinka Shonibare and Sathnam Sanghera is shocking. Interrogation of this gulf has become an important part of my practice. 

Cain Casson: In painting especially, the countryside is reduced to its scenic postcard qualities; little attention is given to the landscape as a ‘lived’ space. Being back home recently, I’ve been exploring familiar forms like feeding troughs, homemade fences and fallen signposts, which, set against endless rolling green hills, are seen as symbols of peaceful rural life. Through paint, obscured qualities of these rudimentary constructions can be uncovered: instability, entrapment and aggression, which are easily overlooked against scenic backdrops. 

Danni Jo Barker: My work is about growth, cultivation of relationships between the living/unliving, material/immaterial, and honesty. It addresses the nature of creative ideas, qualia, and our relationships to them. Recent work has addressed how artistic endeavours are conceived, planted/uncovered, left to dry, and encouraged to develop in the unconscious mind. I use the language of gardening throughout my practice - dirt, seeds, etc. Alongside this, the grid is a recurring element. Sometimes sticking to it, sometimes escaping it.

Liz Omotosho: My paintings delve into the stigmas that frequently prevent people from openly expressing their religious identities, especially when those beliefs are misinterpreted or sidelined by mainstream culture and the art community. This has motivated me to embrace and reflect my own spiritual identity in my art, particularly my relationship with the Celestial Church of Christ, established in 1947, which combines traditional African spiritual elements with Christian doctrines, emphasising prophecy, healing, and spiritual insight.

Mariam Alsaadi: My work explores themes of identity, diaspora, and memory. As an Arab artist raised in the West, I confront the misrepresentations of Arab people that dominate media and narratives, often shaped by fear, exoticism, or Orientalism.

Nahraine Al-Khafaji: My current body of work mourns the destruction of 
archaeological sites and artefacts in recent times due to war and destruction, leading me 
to explore the fragility of history especially after catastrophes. 

Ruby Cascarina: In each of my paintings is a tiny featureless figure carrying a line of string through an isolated and unusual environment. The motif of the string acts as a reminder that our lives continue in spite of our inconsequence. I invite viewers to reflect on the phenomenal nature of the world, and to create meaning in the face of meaninglessness. 

Siddiq Hussain: Themes of hedonism, psychological detachment, transience, and urban decay are all explored in my work. I concentrate on the emotional fallout from indulgence—the voids left by revelry or escape. Recurring themes such as beds, balloons, and drug paraphernalia allude to transient happiness and its aftereffects.

Siobhán Morrissey: I paint and draw on an ambitious scale, often connecting through animals and the powerful Devon landscape that I live in. The human figure and the space it occupies is my main focus. Themes on belonging, mourning and our human fragility are created through an ever deepening emotional relationship with my materials and processes. I believe painting can transcend the life cycles of living and dying.