Andrea Mclean

‘My paintings are imaginary maps. Green Umber roads branch like a Medieval Jesse Tree. There are berries and shoots. Sometimes I think of embroidery or fresco as I paint with oil on a gesso ground on linen. They build up slowly in layers. For me, they are a visual diary of the time spent working on them. I want to show contemporary life with a strong sense of history. Painting, for me, is a way to try to show nature’s changing patterns. With mixtures of earth pigments, manganese blues, vermilions and madder lakes, I paint to chart my day to day experience of the turning world.’

Andrea McLean was born in Wales and grew up in the Forest of Dean. She studied at Falmouth School of Art (1987-90), the Slade School of Art (1992-94) and the British School at Rome on an Abbey Scholarship in Painting (1994-95).

Andrea’s work has been widely exhibited and is to be found in private and public collections including The British Library. In 2010 her painting A Contemporary Mappa Mundi was on display at The British Library and she was also artist in residence at The Bleddfa Centre, Powys.