Artist's Statement
I have a masters degree in painting from The Royal College of Art. At the conclusion of that experience, I returned to impressionist realism, having explored abstraction and contemporary art. The art world has become disconnected from the real world, making overpriced art for those with esoteric insight. I am drawn to the charm of the English countryside and the skills required to distill and represent it impressionisitcally.
My subjects are flora and fauna...their swelling charm and experiential peace in a human world faulted by our frantic avarice. As William Wordsworth observed...
The World is Too Much With Us
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers,
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not. —Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.
History
In Summary...
Valerie Ellis is a British-Australian artist whose impressionist realism valorises the visual appeal of flora and fauna. With a background in psychotherapy and formal training at The Royal College of Art, Ellis’ work captures visual sensation through painterly gesture and luminous realism. Her practice embodies impressionism not simply as a visual method, but as a theory of human experience. Influenced by Degas, Monet and Sorolla, Ellis creates contemporary works that combine the appearance of the subject with the emotional sensation of seeing it.
A Life in Impressionism
Valerie Ellis is a British-Australian visual artist whose practice is grounded in a profound engagement with impressionism — not merely as a style, but as a theoretical framework for perceiving and translating reality. Originally trained in strict representational portraiture, Ellis evolved through phases of abstraction and conceptual exploration, influenced by her background in psychotherapy, before arriving at her current mode: an impressionist realism that captures not the literal, but the experienced natural world.
Ellis' work embodies the core principles of impressionism as a philosophy: the ephemeral, the emotive and the fragmented experience of light and form. Rather than a detailed replication of nature, her paintings offer a psychological encounter with it, reflecting both external phenomena and the internal human response to them.
Early Life
Born in Adelaide, Australia to British émigré parents, Ellis' early childhood was divided between continents. At age six, following her parents' divorce, she returned to England with her mother to live with grandparents. This duality of homeland and heartland — of belonging and displacement — subtly informs Ellis' later sensitivity to fleeting emotional states and the reassurance provided by visual beauty.
Ellis’ talent for art was recognised early; graduating from secondary school in 1984, she achieved the highest national mark in art examinations. Although offered a place at Epsom College of Art to study fashion, she chose instead to return to Australia, charting an unconventional path studying psychology at The University of Queensland, earning both Bachelor and Honours degrees by 1996, with a particular focus on attribution theory — a study of how people explain behaviour, foreshadowing her future integration of psychological depth into visual impressionism.
Career and Artistic Development
Ellis’ early professional life was in psychotherapy, working with Queensland Corrective Services and later in private practice. This immersion in human complexity and emotional nuance became foundational to her artistic education. In the early 2000s, Ellis began her career change, shifting from psychology to design, then to art - teaching herself to paint with classical realism.
In 2019, Ellis returned to England, settling in Surrey. This relocation sparked an exploration of art history. In 2020, her painting 'Beauty and Determination' was selected by Beverley Knight for the ING Discerning Eye exhibition — an early recognition of her emotive portraiture rooted in impressionist ideals of subjectivity and vitality.
In 2021 Ellis' 'Touch Me' collection, exhibited at Espacio Gallery, embraced the gestural immediacy championed by abstract expressionism — informing an impressionist emphasis on process and sensation. Later that year, her 'First Impressions' series explored the conceptual drives of contemporary art. By physically crumpling and smoothing paper, then applying charcoal, Ellis symbolised a "topography of hurt," merging the material and psychological landscapes in one immediate impression. Similarly, her experimental pulp series 'Spread Too Thin' (2022), symbolically addressed contemporary anxieties.
Artistic Education
In 2023, Ellis was accepted into The Royal College of Art, undertaking a Masters in Painting and exhibiting in the RCA Kensington gallery and curating the MAW (Middle-Aged Women) exhibition. Her time at the RCA expanded her conceptual vocabulary but, she reacted against the pretensions of the contemporary art world. For Ellis, the ideal balance of psychological and aesthetic values is reflected in the impressionist ethos.
Influences and Style
Ellis’ influences span from Degas' composition to Chaim Soutine’s individualistic brushwork to the humanity of Mary Cassatt and exquisite skill of Joaquín Sorolla. Her admiration for figures like Paula Rego and Helen Frankenthaler reflects her embrace of personal expression.
While grounded in the traditions of 19th-century impressionism, Ellis’ work is resolutely contemporary: it acknowledges that impressions are not only visual but psychological, that the modern subject is shifting as light on a river. Through her synthesis of psychotherapeutic insight and painterly sensitivity, Valerie Ellis offers a renewed, theoretically enriched impressionism for the 21st century.
exhibition review
Erin Caswell, Salterton Arts Review
A look at the latest series by Valerie Ellis, artist and former psychotherapist. Spread Too Thin once again captures the Zeitgeist of our current moment.
Today’s post is a rare commercial gallery outing for the Salterton Arts Review. Even rarer, this is an artist whose work we have seen before. Valerie Ellis is a British-Australian artist whose journey to art took a somewhat circuitous path. Her twenty years working as a psychotherapist have helped to shape an artistic practice at the intersection of art and psychology. In Touch Me, the series the Salterton Arts Review visited in 2021 at London’s Espacio Gallery, Ellis examined brushwork as the traces of a physical presence, at a time when we were all starved for touch and human connection.
Ellis’s next series, which I discussed with the artist but have not had the privilege of seeing up close, took this art/psychology connection a step further. First Impressions is a metaphor for the traces childhood leaves on the psyche. Paper is crumpled and smoothed, the resulting lines and wrinkles highlighted, for instance with a soft layer of pastel. The result is topographical: at the same time visually compelling and a powerful way of making manifest that the past, for good or bad, cannot be undone.
And now Spread Too Thin once again captures the Zeitgeist by exploring the boundary between art and psychology. Ellis explains:
“When spread too thin, people become fragile, frayed at the edges, buckling under pressure and vulnerable. This series is a minimalist, symbolic reflection of the experience we all encounter when we take on too much, try too hard to impress others by pushing ourselves beyond healthy limits and overextending ourselves.”
An intriguing offering, which I was keen to see for myself.
Overextension Laid Down On Paper
The concept here is simple. Ellis has taken paper pulp, often white but sometimes with colour, and pushed it to its limits. Literally spread it too thin. The result is a variety of different textures. The titles of the works often give a hint as to the process and sometimes the intention. We see for instance Swept, Poked, Blobbed which physically embody these actions. Shattered, Inundated or Stretched do double duty as actions and mental states. Shattered was a particular favourite of mine, delicate fragments of cellulose mounted and framed, incredibly tactile.
Aside from the concept, for me it is the tactile nature of these artworks which makes them so interesting. This series essentially captures a physical action and preserves it as a moment in time. I found myself getting up close. Looking at where the paper lifts proud of the mount, where it is thicker or thinner. It seems a shame almost to have the glass between us, and I agreed with something Valerie said to me in conversation: that some samples of the paper would have been a nice addition to allow visitors to experience the physicality of them. I don’t think samples would have lasted long, however. What is already spread too thin will quickly break down under the slightest pressure.
And this brings me to my reflection after visiting the exhibition. As with Ellis’s previous series, this is art which surfaces an issue by making it physical, but it remains up to the viewer to decide what to do with that information. In Spread Too Thin, the clue is in the title. Spread too thin. We know what it feels like to spread ourselves too thin. It’s uncomfortable. It’s unsustainable. What I’m still unsure of is what we do about it. But giving the answers tied up neatly with a bow is not the role of art, after all. The viewer, like the burned-out individual, is an active agent and needs to take a role in the process.
I’m afraid today’s post is something of a teaser, as I visited on the last day of the exhibition and so haven’t given you the opportunity to see it for yourself. You can see the series here online, with better images than I was able to capture in Noho Studios’ underground space.
Once more I look forward to seeing what is next from Valerie Ellis. These conceptual series lend themselves to a distinct series of production before moving on to the next idea (I mean maybe not: how many Concetto Spaziale did Fontana produce, for instance?). I expect that Ellis’s next exhibition will be different again, but look forward to her continuing to capture and distill our unpredictable times through art.
exhibition review
Gemma Moore, (MFA), Artist & IYP Consultant for Esmee Fairbairn, London.
“Upon entering the gallery space, I was immediately drawn to the relatability of the show's poster. Spread Too Thin is an expression so many of us can relate to when considering how messy and stressful our experiences of the world can be.
Once I learnt that the materiality of paper was a representation of skin, the exhibition's logic became apparent; the handling of the paper represents what our minds can feel like. This was represented through material. It was a representation of how much we try to cover and compensate for over time. The way in which the paper had been malfunctioned, manipulated and disrupted reflected the way in which our skin and bodies become damaged by the pressures of life. The works were abstract drawings with paper, characterised by broken and disrupted marks. This once again references the how the world leaves us feeling – broken, and our thoughts are often distracted, disrupted and disturbed. The exhibition reminded me of an amazing book I read titled How to Get your Life Back by John Eldredge.
Saturated distinctly signified our bodily response to stress and concern. The way in which the paper had been manipulated to its thinnest point reflected what we call our “breaking point”. The work represented the aesthetics of our sayings "I am shattered" or "broken". The work was a physical representation of how we can sometimes feel. Something tangible that articulates how we feel inside, which is difficult. The paper’s textures, tones and shapes appeared bodily and reflected human like characteristics.
I also thoroughly enjoyed Valerie's constant and rigorous questioning of the work's interaction with viewers and its presence in the space."
In the Media
Art Critic Blog
Ellis is increasingly on the London artistic radar, with visits to her exhibition from several tastemakers... Speaking to Valerie about her work was a wonderful privilege...She describes the paintings as a way to push beyond figurative representation; instead communicating her own physical presence as a person who chose colours, laid down
Ellis is increasingly on the London artistic radar, with visits to her exhibition from several tastemakers... Speaking to Valerie about her work was a wonderful privilege...She describes the paintings as a way to push beyond figurative representation; instead communicating her own physical presence as a person who chose colours, laid down brushstrokes. Ellis’s work shows technical talent as well as an insightful purpose behind her recent abstract canvases. I look forward to seeing what comes next...
A refreshing take on the theme of touch and connection from an Australian artist in London. Valerie Ellis is one to watch.
Erin Caswell, the Salterton Arts Review.
News Site
Psychologists believe this bias to favour tall leaders may stem from an evolved preference for physically imposing chiefs who could dominate enemies.
Psychotherapist and artist, Valerie Ellis, says: “Men of power are often depicted on a pedestal or a horse and having those around you ‘looking-up’ to you is a strategic psychological move. T
Psychologists believe this bias to favour tall leaders may stem from an evolved preference for physically imposing chiefs who could dominate enemies.
Psychotherapist and artist, Valerie Ellis, says: “Men of power are often depicted on a pedestal or a horse and having those around you ‘looking-up’ to you is a strategic psychological move. The usual evolutionary explanation for the appeal of height is that it provides a survival advantage to the individual and the species; the ability to kill more game, out-run predators and attract prospective mates means height is naturally selected for genetically.”
While it appears the odds are stacked against shorties, it is not all doom and gloom.
Nick Harding
Magazine
Former psychotherapist Valerie Ellis says this video-first format is likely to have a huge impact on our brains – and not in a good way.
‘For consumers, video content is also more demanding to process mentally – more than double, perhaps as much as 10x more cognitively demanding, than a static image,’ she says.
‘The brain has a capacity tha
Former psychotherapist Valerie Ellis says this video-first format is likely to have a huge impact on our brains – and not in a good way.
‘For consumers, video content is also more demanding to process mentally – more than double, perhaps as much as 10x more cognitively demanding, than a static image,’ she says.
‘The brain has a capacity that can be exhausted and, once exhausted, needs to be replenished.
‘But, because social media is 24/7 and designed to be addictive, the brain is not rested and becomes more and more overwhelmed with demand.’
Online News Network, Metro50
Magazine
Magazine
As Valerie Ellis, a former therapist turned artist whose work explores interpersonal and feminist issues, explains: “It’s a combination of genetic/evolutionary factors and cultural stereotypes... Culturally, men are held to less rigorous ‘beauty’ standards...this has translated into the extreme youth culture women are subjected to and int
As Valerie Ellis, a former therapist turned artist whose work explores interpersonal and feminist issues, explains: “It’s a combination of genetic/evolutionary factors and cultural stereotypes... Culturally, men are held to less rigorous ‘beauty’ standards...this has translated into the extreme youth culture women are subjected to and into pornography that takes physical ideals to bizarre extremes of Barbie-doll figures. Happily, as culture advances, these simplistic and harmful stereotypes are challenged and replaced with more nuanced indicators of individual value. Social media has made a positive contribution by exposing the variety in human form and inclusion into social standards.”
Magazine
Magazine
Magazine
"Former psychotherapist Valerie Ellis and Maria Bailey, founder of Grief Specialists, both point out that it might feel strange to mourn someone you’ve never met. The sense of familiarity with the Queen and the loss associated with her death may feel silly to some people, even as they’re grieving, which makes it harder to talk about.
“Try
"Former psychotherapist Valerie Ellis and Maria Bailey, founder of Grief Specialists, both point out that it might feel strange to mourn someone you’ve never met. The sense of familiarity with the Queen and the loss associated with her death may feel silly to some people, even as they’re grieving, which makes it harder to talk about.
“Try to stay with the feelings you have until you can describe them clearly to yourself, if not to anyone else. There is likely to be a mixture of feelings and thoughts and it’s fine to have lots of different perspectives on the same moment,” Ellis tells us.