Anne Lynch

ELECTED ARWS 2019 & RWS 2021

Anne Lynch, born in Edinburgh, studied at Edinburgh Art College then moved to London where she now has a studio, and another in France.  She has always worked in watercolour and uses collage to sustain the mark and luminosity.

She won the Purchase Prize at the RWS Contemporary Watercolour Exhibition in 2017, the Art Critic Award in the RI at the Mall Galleries in 2018 and was shortlisted for the Drawing Bursary Discerning Eye exhibition in 2014.

Anne Lynch says of her work, "My first introduction to painting was landscape in Scotland and when I moved to London I missed the easy access to that source and grew more reliant on an internal journey. Story telling, myths and dreams showed me a useful way to introduce my own idiosyncrasies within my work. For example in myths the spirit of the person is often held within vessels, and eyes are found peeking out of many of my vessels. Issues around caring and nurturing are laced through these stories and also in my work

My fascination with hands and the many associations with them, caring, protecting, nurturing, tender, or symbolically fate, grew from studying the Cycladic figures. References to travels of Egypt, Thailand and recently Sicily creep into the paintings. I include parts of objects or faces so that the story of the painting is not necessarily complete, but the viewer can bring their own response. In an attempt to lure a conversation between them, I juxtapose my figures with landscapes, or interiors more like dream space. I mainly use watercolour as I love the delicacy and immediacy of the mark. Collage is very important to sustain the light within the colour and create a playfulness within the story.

The works concentrating on trees are inspired by the trees on the West Coast of France near St George-de-didonne.  They remind me of dancers as they stretch and bend their way across the sky line with a great sense of line and humour."