CAMILLA WATSON

Camilla graduated with a BA (Hons) in Fine Art Drawing and Painting from the Edinburgh College of Art in 2004. She studied for two years at the Leith School of Art and gained a 'Distinction' for consistently excellent work. Camilla has exhibited in both the Visual Arts Scotland exhibition and the Scottish Society of Artists exhibitions, winning the SSA 'Kilmorack Award'. She has also exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy's annual exhibition, winning the Latimer Award for meritorious work. Her work is held in many private and corporate collections. 

Camilla's paintings search for the connection between the past and the present to give a genuine expression of human experience in conjunction with the land. She uses mixed-media elements in her landscape paintings, including text and map imagery, to tell the story of the land and historical subject matter forms the basis of her work.

Camilla works with reproductions of historical maps as collage and also uses text elements from old parish records and other local documents. The paintings explore the continuing presence of the past on these places and allude to the people who lived their lives before. The paintings look to the edges of traditional landscape painting, finding abstracted motifs and using strong colour to create a memorable atmosphere and a sense of timelessness.

'I want to find the connection between the past and the present to give a genuine expression of human experience in the landscape.   My painting suggests the narratives hidden within the picture and through this the viewer may feel a sense of the past and the way it gives its character to our contemporary experience of a place and, sometimes subtlely, affects our own experience".