Hilary Paynter

 I normally work directly onto end-grain wood with rudimentary drawings from ideas that I have been refining mentally and this allows development of the engraving on the block.  Lately, I have begun making large wood engraving collages.

There is always an urgency in my work because of my commitments to the SWE and RE and I have developed rapid engraving techniques.  Generally, I have several blocks in progress at any time and move between them.  I enjoy the occasional constraints of working to a commission.  I listen to Radio 4 or stories on cassette/CD while I work.

BIOGRAPHY

Hilary Paynter, Hon.RWS, Hon.RBSA, FRSA, has been President of the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers from 2006 to 2011 and Chairman of the Society of Wood Engravers from 1999 to 2006. She was born in 1943 in Dunfermline and attended the Portsmouth College of Art in Sculpture and Wood Engraving followed by and MA and MSC in Psychology from London University. Hilary pursued two parallel careers in wood engraving and Special Needs education for 30 years and became a fulltime artist since 2000. In the ealry 1980s she revived the then moribund Society of Wood Engravers.

She has had many solo exhibtions in arts instituitons around the country such as Bankside Gallery, London; Durham City Art Gallery; Dundee Printmakers; Edinburgh Printmakers; Northern Print, Newcastle; Royal Birmingham Society of Artists and her wood engravings have been featured in many illustrated books.

Hilary's work has also entered sevweral public national and international collections at the V&A, Ashmolean, Yale Collection of British Art, Hereford and Durham City Art Galleries, Heilongjiang Museum and the Universities of London and Northumbria Collections. Her work can also be seen in two major public commissions in Newcastle: at the Central Station Metro and The Media Exchange.

Hilary was interviewed by BBC for Woman’s Hour and Kaleidoscope, and filmed by BBC for Off the Wall and We are (not) Amused (about cartoons of royalty).