Sarah Dunton

"I graduated in Fine Art at Leeds University, following the specialist painting and printmaking option.

Over the following few years I worked in the art therapy department of a large psychiatric hospital in North London, later as art therapist and project organiser in special schools and residential homes for young adults. I began etching classes at Morley College and started to sell prints through various galleries. Eventually I was able to establish a studio at home, where I paint, draw and etch on a full-time basis. Recently I have also started to work in silver and gold to produce items of jewellery which complement the subject matter of my two-dimensional images.

I work primarily in pencil, ink, pastel and watercolour, frequently combining different media. My etchings are drawn on to zinc plate, using a combination of grounds and aquatint. Editions are therefore small in number, usually around fifty.

My images are derived from memory and feeling, and a love of the line drawn, rather than from direct observation. I paint to convey emotion experienced. My work is a tribute to the natural world and people in it are at peace with it and absorbed into it. Recurring themes are gardeners, cooks, birds, animals and still lives.

Paintings, decorative wooden boxes, brooches and special edition etchings can be produced to commission.

I have exhibited widely, several times at the Royal Academy summer exhibition and at the Royal West of England Academy and have work in private collections across the world. I am also a regular exhibitor at the Leeds Art Fairs. I was a member of the Greenwich Printmakers for ten years, before returning to the North of England."