“And suddenly, with just a few simple marks, we are transported to distant lands.”
Directly inspired by residencies undertaken in 2024, one in Canada and a second in Spain, Louise Hardy’s most recent work revisits an earlier fascination with landscape. Echoes of the monumental, prismatic cityscapes made during her Masters’ degree at City and Guilds of London Art School remain but, breaking free from the familiarity of her stencil-based process, a shift has taken place from the cerebral to the more physical. The change of routine and pace had a profound effect, allowing her time to experiment intensively with the renewed urgency, energy and immediacy that comes with drawing from life in unfamiliar environments.
In the resulting works on paper, the tumultuous vitality of nature jumps off the page: concise brushstroke becomes a wave crashing against jagged cliff faces; underneath dark interwoven marks, delicate washes of ink become storm-filled skies glimpsed through broken ruins; in a warm palette of ochres and siennas, blurred traces of a soft morning light radiate across an arid topography of mountain and rock. A temporal dimension weaves through these pieces - a mapping of time and space - suggesting a moment in flux alive with kinetic potential, as the disorientating, tilting perspectives powerfully draw the viewer in.
Materiality is at the root of Hardy’s practice, using her chosen mediums with spontaneity and jeopardy, alongside a fierce desire for control, resulting in a dynamic tension, ambiguity and physicality. Her instinct for image-building is fed by an obsession with aerial photography, the detritus of war, brutalist architecture and the abandoned “Ghost City” construction sites of China. This, alongside her love of mark-making, owe a debt of gratitude to the work of Julie Mehretu, Joan Mitchell and Carol Rhodes, whose complex structures, intuitive gestural painting and imaginary landscapes respectively, continue to inform her practice.
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London-based artist Hardy studied painting at the Ruskin School of Fine Art at Oxford University. After graduating, she was awarded a year-long travel scholarship in Southern Israel, resulting in a sell-out London show on her return. Exhibitions followed regularly in the UK and overseas, alongside a successful career in film design and theatre administration.
After two years at Morley College on its Fine Art Mentoring course, she completed an MA in Fine Art at City & Guilds of London Art School graduating in 2023 with a Distinction. In 2024 she was accepted on two month-long art residencies, one in Newfoundland, Canada and the other in Southern Spain. She will show the resulting work in London in early 2025.
Her paintings are held in private collections, both nationally and internationally, including major purchases by Reuters and the Financial Services Authority in Canary Wharf.
SOLO SHOWS
2024 Moving On, Astor Theatre, Deal, Kent
2018 Traces of the City – New Work, Gallery Maison Bertaux, Soho, London
2017 Gallery @ Romeo Jones, Dulwich, London
2017 Look mum no hands! Old Street, London
2015 Jumping for Joy, The Studio, Eastry, Kent
2015 Cadence Performance Ltd, South London
2014 Gallery @ Romeo Jones, Dulwich, London
SELECTED SHOWS
2023 SWA Summer Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London
2021 Showcase Exhibition, The Dolphin, London
2021 Summer Exhibition, Anna Lovely Gallery, London
2021 SWA Summer Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London
2018 SWA Summer Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London
2016 SWA Summer Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London
GROUP SHOWS
2025 Off/Centre, TURPS BANANA, Peckham Safehouse, London
2025 FOUND|LAND, The Morley Gallery, London
2023 Expressions of Judaism, Kent House, Knightsbridge, London
2023 MA Degree Show, CGLAS London
2023 Interim Degree Show, City and Guilds of London Art School
2022 Meet me Halfway, The Art Pavilion, London
2021 For a Long Moment, Morley Gallery, London
2021 Interruptions, Espacio Gallery, London
AWARDS AND RESIDENCIES
2024/25 TURPS BANANA Off-Site Mentoring Programme
2024 Artists Residency Programme: Joya: AiR, Velez Blanco, Spain
2024 Artists Residency Programme: The Pouch Cove Foundation, Canada
Arad Arts Project Travel Scholarship, Israel
Art History Scholarship, Peggy Guggenheim Museum, Venice
EDUCATION
2021-2023 Masters in Fine Art, City and Guilds of London Art School (Distinction)
2019-21 Fine Art Mentoring Course (2years): Morley College, London
1985-86 Post-graduate Diploma in Film and TV Design, Kingston Polytechnic
1982-85 Bachelor in Fine Art Degree, Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, Oxford
1981-82 Pre-BA Art Foundation Course, Blackpool College of Art & Technology
COLLECTIONS
Reuters and Financial Services Authority, Canary Wharf, London
Work in private collections: UK, Portugal, Holland, Israel, USA, Canada and South Africa
Portrait photography courtesy of Frederic Aranda