Samantha Wilkins

Sam lives and works from her studio in Gloucester.  She paints lusciously coloured semi-abstract landscapes based on her observations of trees and water in landscapes she has encountered on her frequent walks, many of which are in the Forest of Dean, Cotswolds and trips to the coast. Born and raised in the countryside Sam has always had a great appreciation for the outdoors and forests in particular.
At school, despite showing a proficiency for art, she believed you were either an artist or a scientist so she pursued a degree in Mathematics and a successful career in IT.   She now knows this to be untrue, you can be both of these things and more. When the pandemic struck, and during lockdown she decided to re-ignite her passion for painting and developed her unique style.  Predominantly using acrylic paint she makes additional marks in charcoal, acrylic pen or scraping the surface with different tools. She enjoys making up her own mediums to give a texture and depth to her work.
Her observations frequently have a mathematical aspect to them and she looks for the geometry in the shapes before her, blocking out these shapes, finding patterns, playing with negative space and a trying to find that delicate equilibrium, similar to an algebraic equation, that balances colour, texture and form for a pleasing outcome.
It is her background in mathematics that makes her work, particularly the composition, so aesthetically pleasing.  She says of her experience of art and maths:
“In all of these disciplines there is a commonality - in finding truth. And there is a beauty in them all. There is beauty in the body and how it works, there is a beauty in constructing something useful or discovering something new. And mathematics (and art) gives us the language to describe these beautiful concepts.”