Kirsten Elswood’s primary interests are landscape and still-life painting and each has a separate focus for her.  With landscape, she explores atmosphere and composition - she tries to capture the ‘peace of the wild’ - the feeling of being out in the land with its weather changes, energy, scent and light. She does this by regularly going out painting and sketching ‘en plein air’ - developing these works further in the studio. She particularly enjoys strong contrast and working with contre-jour - with the sun behind the subject, to create drama and interest.

Still-life painting allows her to concentrate on the subtleties - colour, form and shadow. Painting a flower still-life is a much less gestural exercise and more a meditative and contemplative experience for Kirsten, where small shifts of tone describe the structure of flowers.

Kirsten studied Fine Art in Exeter and has continued her professional development through post-graduate study and year-long courses at Newlyn School of Art, where she has completed a Defining Practice and Professional Landscape course.  She continues to push her work, exploring new methods and materials. She is an acclaimed painter, winning her place on Sky’s Landscape Artist of the Year and being selected for the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolour at the Mall Galleries in 2024.

She enjoys working in different media - playing with the transparency of watercolour, the immediacy of acrylic and gouache, and loving the richness of oil paint.  Her paintings often take many months to finish, as she builds texture and depth.