Helen
ELLIOTT
CONTEMPORARY ARTIST
Life - Landscape - Seasons - Soul
THE LOVE OF COLOUR, a love of the small daily things of life , and sharing the sheer joy of paint, are the reasons I make art. It's totally my thing.
Almost as much my thing as are simple pleasures of life ... the dog walk, the first snowdrops, the geese on the estuary, the perfect cup of tea, lunch with a friend...
"Colour is everything. When colour is right, form is right." - Marc Chagall.
I remember being completely in love with colour as early as 8 years old when my Uncle George (he who had been a desert rat, and in his 70’s still sported a rather dapper pencil moustache) presented me with a tin box of watercolours.
They were a thrill to behold! A dazzling array of row upon row of jewel-like lemons, fuchsias, and turquoises. It seemed to my eight-year-old self that I was in heaven and held the key to artistic bliss in my hands. However, this was in fact the first time I was to experience creative disappointment. The colours, when applied with a rough black bristle brush to thin newsprint paper, were lifeless. The paper wore through as I tried to apply increasing layers of the insipid colours to achieve some of the tin’s promised lustre.
After so many years I still vividly remember both the anticipation and disappointment of that event. And it's been my lifelong mission to find colour that satisfies. I think I'm almost there.
“Joyful, colour-rich paintings to brighten your home and lift its mood.”
I’m a painter, educator, and mentor living in the coastal hills of West Wales—a landscape that gently shapes how I see and how I paint. Though I’ve always felt creativity running through me, it wasn’t always encouraged. I was asked to leave art class as a child, so I followed another path for a time, studying psychology and working in that field until a serious illness turned everything around. Painting found me again—not as a hobby, but as something vital and necessary.
For over 25 years now, I’ve worked full-time as an artist, creating from my home studio and gallery where visitors are always welcome by appointment. My paintings are often described as joyful or uplifting, and that means a lot to me. The work draws from landscape, memory, people I meet on my walks—especially the ones with dogs—and from something deeper I don’t always have words for.
Alongside painting, I help other artists grow their work and their confidence, blending what I’ve learned through art and psychology.
At the heart of it all is this: to share something true, to offer joy, and to paint from a place of quiet remembering.
Career highlights include:
Solo show at the International Museum of Naïve Art in Paris (2012);
FIVAN, International Art shows in Poland and France (2008-2015);
Reading Contemporary (2016, 2017)
The National Trust Gallery, Dinefwr, Llandeilo, 2015-18.
The Museum of Modern Art, Wales, 2018.
RESIDENCIES
Artist in Residence at:
International Festival of Naïve Art Loire, France (2016)
AiR Vallauris, Cannes, France (2015)
COLLABORATIONS
Selected to train in America by Golden Artists Paints, Inc, USA to be one of their international artist educators (2015 - 2025)
Selected by Silver Brush Company UK & Europe demonstrator (2019 -)
BOOKS
Creative Me - The Joy of Paint (Graffeg 2015)
ILLUSTRATIONS
All Teachers Great & Small (Hachette)
Paradise Found (Graffeg)
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