Zoe Walker

Zoe Walker; Abstract Artist

My name is Zoe Walker and I’m an Abstract Artist currently living in Oxford. I grew up with my parents in the leafy county of Hampshire and it was there that I first started drawing inspiration from the unusual surfaces of the ground and exploring the textures of the natural world around me. I took an Art and Design foundation course at the University for Creative Arts (UCA) in Farnham and stayed on to then study BA Hons in Textiles for Fashion and Interiors for a further three years.

Instinct told me I was a creative individual and I thought my degree path would help me to develop my individual style as an artist. However, I was surprised to find myself lacking direction at the beginning of my course and feeling somewhat lost. I didn’t feel as though I had any idea of how to personally progress towards my own way of working. But I was determined to persevere and thankfully my endurance was rewarded when a new course leader was appointed. They were dynamic and engaging, and not only took a real interest in my work, but recognised a potential in me that needed some gentle guidance. I still remember that first tutorial as though it were yesterday. I had a real connection with her, so much so that our 15 minute session suddenly turned into an hour! We discussed new techniques I could experiment with and just like that I started going from Cs to A*s. It was as though she had shaken me and said “Zoe, this is what you’re meant to be doing!” She helped me to completely redefine my creative output just by opening my mind to a new way of thinking and I will be forever grateful to her for showing me the way. It was a daunting period because it felt as though I was stuck in a painter’s mind while trying to work with textiles and my new way of working allowed little time for thinking, which meant I was creating from instinctive reactions to my surroundings. I explored the great outdoors capturing surface details and transposing them in to pieces of tactile art, exactly the kind of thing I would lose myself in back at home in Hampshire. I experimented using a loom and various unusual yarns (of which linen was my favourite) and it fascinated me to see the different effects they produced. My old perfectionist habits were erased and replaced with a new, exhilarating method of creativity. This was it; this was the beginning of my career as an artist! It was a pivotal point in my artistic career as it led to my discovery of ‘Divine Timing’, a concept which holds huge importance in my everyday life as an artist and an individual. For those who are unfamiliar with the phrase allow me to enlighten you. Divine Timing is the idea that everything happens exactly when it is ‘supposed’ to, and in just the right way. The saying ‘everything happens for a reason’ springs to mind, and it’s not far off. That one tutorial guided me towards a new way of working, at just the right time. I felt excited and liberated; finally my passion for art and textiles had begun.

I spent the long hot summer after graduation working in an interior design shop and furiously painting in my parent’s back garden, which, much to their dismay, I covered in paint! Though elated by my revived love for painting, I still felt somewhat obligated to pursue a career in the textiles industry. I was soon scouted by Amtico, the UK’s no.1 vinyl flooring company, who had spotted my work at New Designers - a showcase for graduates in Angel, London. It was a fantastic opportunity and I entered into a four-month contract working at their site in the West Midlands. It was more of a ‘desk’ design job than a hands-on creative role and I soon discovered that I disliked how all the organic work created was transformed into a digital representation. I still feel that digitally informed art changes the very purpose of a piece simply because I like to paint and create and there it is, done. I don’t want it edited or remastered on a screen. They say that art is never finished, only abandoned, and I do feel there is a special knack to knowing when to stop. I don’t like to go over my work, especially when using acrylics as they have their own ‘Divine Timing’. They stop exactly where they are meant to; so if I have put them there in a moment of inspired creativity, then that is where they are supposed to be.

The colours I use in my work have gone through various transformations over the past few years. They have developed and changed with me, holding different significance along the way. Towards the end of my time at Amtico, blacks, greys and other dark tones were prominent, with the occasional flicker of yellow - a warning, and red - danger. I wanted fresh inspiration and that is when rediscovered dancing. The connection between art and movement was one I had never considered before but it made total sense; the feeling you get from a piece of music and the way you transpose that feeling into movement is the same process as transposing a feeling onto a canvas. The two have a symbiotic relationship and inspired me in such a way that my paintings began to transform. The dark colours that had begun to dominate where gradually replaced by neon!

The energy I found from neon dancing nights was incredible – you show up in your bright clothes and dance in the dark with strangers, letting go of inhibition and simply having fun. When I was dancing, I was glowing, outside and inside, literally and metaphorically! I feel like I glow when I paint too and I started seeing myself as an individual that can exist by myself and enjoy my own existence, body, and mind. I felt free. This connection was something I wanted to explore further and when I obtained a role as a fitness instructor at a wellbeing spa, I had an opportunity to. I was introduced to Angel Card Readings, yoga classes, and amazing people who were calm and connected with their inner selves. I felt empowered by the strong women around me, and the fact that they were women was an important one. Feminine influence runs deep within my work and the solidarity of spending time with peaceful female energy made a huge impact on me. The colours started changing again; pink, gold, and red. Red, that colour that had always meant danger to me, took on a whole new meaning; it wasn’t the same pillar-box tone I was using before, it had progressed into maroon, magenta, and ruby with hints of purple and blue. There was happiness behind it that wasn’t there before and it signified abundance, joy, and creativity.

In regards to how I paint now, acrylics, metallic, and textured spray paint are just some of the mediums I most enjoy working with. I predominantly paint on canvas but I did experiment on wood, considering the majority of my inspiration comes from nature. I think it is so important – what we see. What we observe and take in and how it makes us feel as we do so. This is what I draw my inspiration from and what I aim to recreate in my work. The connection between the outward observation and the inner being is what drives my art, it is not purely based on sight alone, but what I feel. I think that is probably why my work is so tactile, it makes you want to touch it, feel it, and explore it with more senses than just sight. When it comes to my inspiration, there is a huge emphasis on empowerment, selflove, and putting women at the centre. I want to represent my progression as an artist through the dark, to the neon and recently through more pastel colours which are soft, elegant, and calming. I feel that the differentiation of colours throughout my work represents human emotion. It signifies the highs and lows of existence and offers an acceptance to the fact that everyone feels, be it positive or negative. There are always going to be times when we connect more with darker colours, and others when we suddenly feel the need for light, which is why you will see very dark tones contrasted with lighter tones in my paintings. My art is spiritual, it comes from a place of conflict, confrontation, grief, relief, acceptance, and understanding. It grows as I do and represents the lesson I take from every new stage of life I encounter.