Camilla Dowse

Camilla Dowse was born in Berkshire, England, and is currently based in the Cotswolds. Working mainly in acrylic on gesso panels, her impressionistic urban landscapes explore the beauty of the built environment. Camilla studied graphic design at the Berkshire College of Art and for a number of years worked as a picture editor for many of the major book publishers.

Her work has been selected for exhibition by the New English Art Club, the Bath Art Society, the Sunday Times Watercolour Exhibition, and the Society of Women Artists. In 2014 she was named Artist of the Year by Artists & Illustrators Magazine, she was awarded the Chairman’s Prize at the ING Discerning Eye Exhibition in 2017 and 2018, and was presented with the Neil Meacher RI Award by the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours in 2018. She’s a member of the Oxford Art Society and has been invited to exhibit at the Mall Galleries by the art collector and critic John Penrose.

Having painted urban landscapes and period buildings for over twenty-five years Camilla is often approached to paint private homes, businesses, town centres and city streets across the UK and Worldwide.

STATEMENT

Urban areas are busy and densely populated. They’re places we mostly hurry through and rarely stop to consider. My paintings are an invitation to look beyond the fast pace of life in order to contemplate the beauty of the built environment. Like the subjects I paint, my work is constructed, from the wood surface to the layers of gesso which are sanded to a smooth finish before applying saturated colour to carve areas of light and shadow. By removing the transient elements that are a feature of urban living I hope to create a theatrical impression with narrative potential.