Jo Self

Jo Self
Studio, Brixton, London.paintings shown 'Pink Tibetan Lotus' 12ft x 7ft .oil on canvas. 2005.Jo Self.'Ocean'.oil on canvas.2006. 24" x 36".Jo Self.

Jo Self (née Lee; born 15 January 1956) is an English contemporary artist, poet who specializes in often monumental oil paintings of flowers. In 2001-3 she painted in the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, where she was artist-in-residence in the Marianne North studio.

She is currently represented by Browse & Darby (London).

Background

Self was born and grew up on a Hertfordshire rural housing estate. Before becoming an artist, she worked in various jobs including as a croupier ("bunny") at the Playboy Club,and lodged with Ian Board of the Colony Club where she met Francis Bacon artist, Elizabeth Smart writer,author-journalist Jonathan Self (brother of novelist Will Self) to whom she was briefly married. After the birth of her first child she trained at Wimbledon School of Art where her first work was a prize-winning series of narrative paintings including flower images. She subsequently studied at Chelsea College of Art and Design. She has since lectured at Wimbledon and at the Slade School of Fine Art.

Works

She created a painting of the private garden of His Holiness the Dalai Lama in Northern India during a residency of three months between 2004-5. A. S. Byatt summarised the experience of this show—flowers' combination of toughness and fragility—with the Shakespeare quote: "How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea / whose action is no stronger than a flower?"[1]

In 2006-7 Jo Self worked at night from the steps of Tate Britain painting the Thames.

Her works appear in collections including those of Arthur Andersen, London, John Brown Publishing, Schroder Investment Management, Accenture, J Sainsbury plc, Westdeutsche Landesbank, London, and the Dowager Duchess of Devonshire.

Bibliography

References

  1. ↑ Petal Power, AS Byatt, The Guardian, 30 November 2005.
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