Jen Maidment is an oil painter from Yorkshire currently living and working in South Wales. Jen paints portraits and landscapes and is interested in nature and the environment and paints landscapes that reflect hope for the future of our planet. With portraiture, Jen is interested in themes of identity and representation but recently started feeling landscape and portrait coming closer together – nature creeping into the portraits she paints. Jen earned my BA from Reading University and my MA from Wimbledon School of Art, UAL. Having focused mostly on drawing during her education, Jen became increasingly interested in painting. Jen also learned how to embroider a few years ago and got into using that as a form of painting/drawing.
1) Which art movement do you consider most influential on your practice?
I’m influenced more by individual artists than movements.
2) Where do you go and when to make your best art?
I have a studio set up in my house that is just my little space to paint In, though it does get visits from two cats.
3) How do you describe your 'creative process'?
I think creativity – at least for me – is something that happens continuously. If I’m not physically painting, it’s not far from my mind. I keep a folder on my phone of images I find interesting, artists that inspire me or notes for later use. Whether it’s for a landscape or a portrait, I usually work from photos I have taken and then digitally collaged them together.
4) Which artist, living or deceased, is the greatest inspiration to you?
There are so many but I like Henri Rousseau, Frida Kahlo, Peter Doig and Jonas Wood. All of them have a connection to nature or habitat that I find interesting.
5) If you weren't an artist, what would you do?
I honestly don’t know – I like writing though, so probably an equally hard career!
6) What do you listen to for inspiration?
I don’t usually listen to music whilst I work. I either have netflix on in the background or I might listen to a comedy podcast.
7) If you could own one artwork, and money was no object, which piece would you acquire?
Either Jonas Wood’s Untitled M.V Landscape or Peter Doig’s Orange Sunshine or Ski Jacket.
8) If your dream museum or collection owner came calling, which would it be?
National Portrait Gallery?!
9) What is your key piece of advice for artists embarking on a fine art or creative degree today?
If you get stuck for ideas or feel yourself being swayed by too many opinions surrounding you, try to picture what you would want on your own wall first. I find this helps me if I ever feel overwhelmed by too much visual media or if I’m stuck.
10) What is your favorite book of all time (fiction or non fiction)?
Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials and the Book of Dust series. Close seconds are A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness, The Old Kingdom by Garth Nix and Book of the Ancestor by Mark Lawrence.
11) If you could hang or place your artwork in one non traditional art setting, where would that be?
I don’t know how non-traditional it is but I am constantly looking at paintings, etc, in the background of movies and tv shows. That would be pretty cool.
12) What was the biggest lesson your university course or time studying taught you?
Handle your money better!
13) And finally, if we were to fast forward 10 years, where would we find you?
Painting, obviously.
Learn more about Jen and discover her collection of artworks.
