Harriet White
Harriet White is a contemporary realist painter living and working in Bristol, UK. Her work involves large scale paintings, mostly centred around portraiture and often incorporating a floral aspect, creating paintings that suggest a hazy, unclarified narrative. She studied at Falmouth Art College then Bath Spa University College, graduating with a BA (Hons) in Fine Art in 2001. Since then, she has exhibited regularly in the UK and the USA, has twice been selected for the BP Portrait Award and the Holburne Portrait Prize and was a shortlisted artist in the 2013 Threadneedle Prize for Figurative Art.
I paint on a fairly large scale in oils, largely focussing on portraiture, my technique varying between apparent almost photo-reality and a looser, more painterly interpretation. I am drawn to pattern and effect and often stage my source photographs to incorporate ways of disassembling an image, through reflection or lighting, perhaps to push against the perceived restrictions inherent in traditional portraiture. The resulting painting can often seem removed, distant and dreamlike, echoing my feelings of isolation during the strange period of Covid lockdown, during which several of these paintings were made.