“As an artist, it is important to me to physically inhabit a landscape to draw and paint it.

I begin en plein air and my sketching informs line and colour even if, in the end, only a trace of those initial elements will remain in the work.  Back in my studio I use the sketches as the framework for each piece, but the colours become bolder and more playful, more childlike. It is a poetic, romantic, idealised world that I am trying to create on canvas, a world that connects to childhood, memories of places and people.

My finished paintings are simple in a deliberate way, with an essential naivety. My practice draws on a kind of Magical Realism inspired by the landscapes and literary poems and stories that ignite my imagination: things that couldn’t possibly happen, happen.

I want my paintings to create dreamlike places full of wonder that viewers can inhabit.”

Lesley-Ann Eaton, 2025

Biography

Lesley-Ann Eaton studied Fine Art at Falmouth University and went on to work in the creative education departments of Newlyn Art Gallery, South London Gallery, Falmouth University and The Royal Opera House, London. She has been awarded grants by the Arts Council to work as an artist in residence with street children in Mumbai, India; by WOMAD to deliver children's workshops at the festival both in England and internationally; and by the Artist Heritage Service to create children's art workshops at key sites across Northern Ireland. From 2022 to 2023 she studied Studio Practice at the prestigious Newlyn School of Art, and in 2024 graduated from the school’s highly respected one year Professional Landscape Mentoring Programme, with a group exhibition at Tremenheere Gallery, Penzance.

Lesley-Ann is represented by Aisling Gallery, West Cork, Ireland, and The Square Gallery, St Mawes, Cornwall.