Lily Jennings

BA (Hons) Fine Art


Last summer I won a bursary from the university to spend some time in the Icelandic landscape to further my practice. The resulting work is a body of paintings exploring abstraction through colour relationships, using colours inspired by the various landscapes I experienced.

I am interested in the relationship with the sublime of both abstraction and highly-representational Romantic landscape painting. All four of these paintings are landscapes of a sort, but completely lack figurative elements and are essentially representations of ‘nothing’. The triptych’s bright colours and gestural mark-making contrasts with the larger canvas’s off-black tones and minimalistic composition to explore the same concerns through differing formal elements.

These works were also produced in response to the relationship between the female artist and the abstract painting. Historically women’s contribution to abstraction has largely been erased, with movements such as Abstract Expressionism earning a reputation as a very masculine tradition based around the application of the hand of the genius artist. My paintings seek to contribute to a contemporary dialogue of female abstraction which challenges that misconception.


Yr haf diwethaf enillais fwrsari gan y brifysgol i dreulio rhywfaint o amser yn nhirwedd gwlad yr Iâ i gael hybu fy ymarfer. Mae’r gwaith a ddeilliodd o’r daith honno yn gyfres o baentiadau sy’n archwilio’r haniaethol drwy berthnasoedd lliwiau, gan ddefnyddio lliwiau wedi’u hysbrydoli gan y gwahanol fathau o dirweddau a welais yno.

Rwy’n ymddiddori yn y berthynas â’r aruchel sydd gan haniaeth a phaentiadau tirluniau Rhamantaidd cynrychiadol iawn. Mae pob un o’r pedwar paentiad hyn yn fath o dirlun, ond does dim un elfen ffigurol ynddyn nhw o gwbl ac, yn y bôn, maen nhw’n cynrychioli ‘dim’. Mae lliwiau llachar y triptych a’r gwneud marciau awgrymog yn cyferbynnu â thonau llwyd-ddu a chyfansoddiad minimalistaidd y cynfas mwyaf er mwyn archwilio’r un pethau drwy elfennau ffurfiol sy’n wahanol i’w gilydd.

Cafodd y gweithiau hyn eu cynhyrchu hefyd mewn ymateb i’r berthynas rhwng yr artist o fenyw a’r paentiad haniaethol. Yn draddodiadol, cafodd cyfraniad menywod i waith haniaethol ei ddileu i raddau helaeth, â mudiadau megis Mynegiadaeth Haniaethol yn magu enw iddo’i hun am fod yn draddodiad gwrywaidd iawn a oedd yn seiliedig ar law yr athrylith o artist. Nod fy mhaentiadau innau yw cyfrannu i ddeialog gyfoes ar gelf haniaethol gan fenywod sy’n herio’r gamdybiaeth honno.

Other Exhibitors:

Caitlyn Laye

Caitlyn Laye

My artwork was initially inspired by the rave scene which is usually an intense environment of music, colour and lights. I decided to recreate the feelings that my experience evoked, with the use of illuminative acrylics and spray paints on canvas. As spray painting...

Chloe Winder

Chloe Winder

Our species has become increasingly disconnected from nature. I focus on landscapes of personal significance and/or landscapes that have been disrupted by industrial use. Materials from these sites (often rocks, muds, and bricks) are used through a process-orientated...

Rebecca Jones

Rebecca Jones

Non-linear narratives such as unreliable memories, leaky dreams and deja vu are a central reference within my practice. I address the structure of these forms of narrative using repetition, replication and iterations of time. My work is largely sculptural, using...

Rachel Verner

Rachel Verner

Exploring the fragmentation of memory through the physicality of found objects and the spoken word, my work has become an archive of my family history. Due to the archival nature of my work, I replicate ways of preserving my objects through the attentiveness of their...

India Beaudro

India Beaudro

In my current practice I am concerned with the objectivity and phenomenology of colour. Through using media such as light and coloured acetate, my present work is intentionally focused and uncluttered, allowing colour to be considered as a singularity without any...

Katie Berry

Katie Berry

With a love for colour my work addresses form and shape and the impact this has on a space. I am demonstrating how the use of bright colour can create maximum optical impact. I’m interested in pattern and repetition to create a visual aesthetic whilst whilst working...