About Felicity House | Award Winning Pastel Artist

Get to know the award-winning Dorset based artist Felicity House.

Work

Drawing is fundamental to my work. Instinctively searching for lines and shapes that interest me most I make drawings and paintings directly from the subject with a fresh eye and lively hand. I enjoy the challenge of working to the inevitable boundary of time. Editing intuitively and responding with spontaneous expressive marks to create a vital equivalent.

I work primarily in pastel which links colour with drawing and is immediate, fresh and vibrant. Subject matter frequently dictates the medium – I may draw in ink or use watercolours, pastels or oil paints.

I am inspired by travel and new places but equally respond to domestic subject matter; intriguing arrangements and complex interiors are a fascination and of course the ultimate challenge of figures and portraits.

Studio works are developed from my collection of sketchbook drawings or studies made en plein air, evoking the essence of a subject by exploring mark, pigment and support.

I have always drawn

As a young child, paper was in short supply and there was never sufficient for my prolific graphite output. I clearly recall making pencil drawings on the insides of unfolded food cartons, the plain end papers of books and surreptitiously behind curtains on the wonderful surface of painted wall.

I was fortunate to benefit from a post-war education that gave time and status to Art and this encouraged and developed my visual skills. Creating art has always been important to me and I enrolled on various short courses with artists I admired learning piecemeal.

Following a career school teaching I worked as an illustrator and as a tutor of life drawing at the Arts University Bournemouth and tutoring short courses at West Dean College. I now work in my Bournemouth studio in Dorset primarily using soft chalk pastels . I frequently draw on location and paint with watercolours pastels and oils.