Monica Ismay Horn A.R.C.A:
"My family is Jamaican, and I was brought up in the Blue Mountains, coming to England when I was twelve. We settled in Cornwall and at sixteen, I went to Falmouth Art School, and at nineteen, to the Painting School of the Royal College of Art, becoming an Associate in 1966, and winning the David Murray Scholarship for Landscape Painting in the same year. David Horn and I met there, married and became involved in setting up and running the Kingsway Community in London. We were lent a farm in Cornwall and started a workshop, to provide employment for our members. We produced fretsawn wooden puzzles which were exported all over the world.

In 1980 I started teaching part time for St. Clare's, and for the Oxfordshire Adult Education Authorities. From 1993-1997 I taught exclusively for St. Clare's, mainly for the Liberal Arts Programme, teaching American and European University students, but also on the IB, EFL, American High School and Venice Programmes. I also ran my own Easter and Summer Schools, teaching Portrait, Life, Landscape and Flower Painting.

There was little time for my own painting, so in 1997 I decided to leave Oxford, moving to Exmoor to concentrate on my own work. I still do some Adult Education teaching, and for a few years ran Painting Holidays from a friend’s studio on Mull in May and June, and occasional landscape weekends locally for Nettlecombe Court."

These pictures are selected from the 'On-line gallery' section

Monica's Work

"I am essential a lyrical painter, influenced by the environment of my native Jamaica, as well as by the landscapes of Canada and England. I seek to celebrate nature, concentrating on the harmony of relationships to achieve a rhythm and balance in my work. My chief influence has been the work of the Canadian Group of Seven; more noticeably in my recent paintings, where my concern with colour, texture and pattern have developed and found expression in experimenting with different media, notably oil pastels. Having taught for many years such diverse topics as sculpture, batik, print and paper making, I have long felt that I would like to expand the more conventional way that I paint and incorporate some of these disciplines into my work.

I have exhibited in the Summer Exhibition of the Royal Academy, The South West Academy of Fine and Applied Arts, at the Museum of Modern Art Oxford, the Gundry Gallery, The Manor House Gallery, and the Neville Gallery, Canterbury, the Lynda Cotton Gallery, Watchet, and the Book House Gallery, Taunton. From 1995-1997 I was the Membership Secretary for the Oxford Art Society, with whom I have frequently shown. My Portrait of Roger Opie hangs in New College Oxford. In 2000 I opened my studio to the public for Somerset Art Week. As a result of this, I received a bursary and training from "Walk in the Land of Light", and am now concerned with a series of interrelating digital prints, paintings and reliefs, which stem directly from this experience. Besides this, I continue with my long standing interest in landscape and flower painting, concentrating on watercolours, acrylics, and oil pastels, with occasional excursions into mixed media and oils."

These pictures are selected from the 'On-line gallery' section

If you want to buy a picture or discuss a commission,  then send E mail to monica@ismayarts.co.uk  
Copyright © 2007 www.IsmayArts.co.uk
Last modified: May 13, 2007