Clare Woods

June 2025
Roberts Institute of Art

We have invited Clare Woods to join the Roberts Institute of Art Residency in Scotland this June.

Roberts Institute of Art

Clare Woods is a UK-based artist whose practice spans painting, collage and printmaking. Woods’ work explores the relationship between physical form in two-dimensional space, informed by her early training as a sculptor, challenging traditional artistic genres such as landscape, portraiture and still life, engaging with themes of beauty, mortality and loss.

Often blurring the boundaries between abstraction and figuration through fluid brushwork and bold colours, her paintings on gessoed aluminium panels reinterprets personal and found photographs, cropping and repositioning them to create images that feel both familiar and uncanny.

Roberts Institute of Art

While in residence, Clare will draw inspiration from the surrounding gardens and landscape at Cortachy Castle. Taking advantage of the studio space, she will use this dedicated time to test and experiment with materials and ideas that are both central and new to her practice.

Clare Woods

Clare Woods (b. 1972) lives and works in Hereford. Woods was elected a Royal Academician in 2022. She received a BA in Fine Art Sculpture from Bath School of Art in 1994 and an MA in Fine Art from Goldsmith’s College in 1999. In 2024, Woods presented her solo exhibition Between Before and After at Norrtälje Konsthall, Sweden. This coincided with Art/Books publishing Woods’ second monograph As I Please. Other recent notable solo exhibitions include those at CCA Museum, Mallorca (2023) and Serlachius Museum, Finland (2022). Woods has a solo show opening at Stephen Friedman Gallery, New York, in 2025. A major solo exhibition by the artist will also take place at Towner Eastbourne, UK, in 2026. Her work is found in many major public collections including Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, U.S.; Arken Museum of Modern Art, Denmark; Arts Council Collection, London, UK; Government Art Collection, London, UK; The National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, Wales and The Hepworth Wakefield, UK.

Credits

Portrait of the artist, 2023. Copyright Anne Purkiss. Courtesy the artist; Royal Academy of Arts, London and Stephen Friedman Gallery, London and New York. Photo by Anne Purkiss

Clare Woods, Perfect Reader, 2024. Oil on aluminium, 150 x 150cm (59 x 59in). Copyright Clare Woods. Courtesy the artist and Stephen Friedman Gallery, London and New York

Clare Woods, Mingling, 2024. Oil on aluminium, 150 x 150cm (59 x 59in). Private Collection. Copyright Clare Woods. Courtesy the artist and Stephen Friedman Gallery, London and New York

Daisy Parris

Roberts Institute of Art

Martyn Cross

Roberts Institute of Art

Des Hughes

Roberts Institute of Art

Agnieszka Szczotka

Roberts Institute of Art