Northumberland based artist Helen Fay studied Printmaking at Sunderland University before going on to complete a Masters Degree in Natural History Illustration at the Royal College of Art in the early Nineties.
Inspired by everything from early Japanese and Chinese printmaking to the Natural History Illustrations of Thomas Bewick and Charles Tunnicliffe, Helen channels these influences to create her own work. In recent years she has focused on how domesticated animals have become intertwined with our daily lives capturing the quiet moments of intimacy and contemplation she observes in her subjects.
Working with an etching point on copper plates, Helen scratches and burnishes her surfaces before printing these onto sheets of archival paper. She still strives to pare her images down to a balanced simplicity that directs attention to the subject in her pictures, recreating a moment that is timeless yet recognisable and familiar.
