Illuminated Rose
Madder
Victoria Elisabeth Kiff
On Painting in Oils
The dynamics of colour, place and character
The paintings explore many facets, bordering between a place, a person and memory.
They are richly interwoven with colour and embody a painterly surface texture
Having surrounded myself with a collection of carefully selected pictures from which to pursue and reference with an objective, a room, and persons of interest, alongside written extracts, the painting takes on its form. A painting which has the potential to express human experience and embrace the movement of life and light.
The theatre of a figure within a given space encourages me to explore a personal narrative within two conflicting sides of the central character. The disciplinary objects which interact are the fragments to the design as a whole, and place this very unique character or characters in a continuum of thought to dialogue.
Influences range from the expressive and deeply emotional Portraits of Oskar Kokoschka, as in his famous painting ‘The Tempest’ 1914. The paintings by Nicolas de Stael depicting organic shapes of a rich earth palette and the dynamic positioning of the Figures in the manscapes by Keith Vaughan.
Visionary Fine Artist based in Rye East Sussex
Medium: Oil painting, mixed media, drawing, printmaking
Qualifications: Foundation Diploma in Art and Design, Kingston University, London
BA Fine Art, Central St Martins School of Art, London 1996-99
Exhibiting Nationally and Internationally ; Art Fairs in London and New York ; Represented artist at Cameron Contemporary Brighton
;First Solo exhibition, ‘Works on Paper’ November 2009 at 86 Commercial Street London E1
Most recent: ‘Portraits; A Visual Narrative, September 2025 at Cameron Contemporary Art Gallery, Brighton and Hove
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The paintings, drawings and prints of Victoria Kiff often consist of a figure or figures within a landscape setting . The complex layering of paint layers forms a deep visual language. 'My preoccupation with the central figure or figures, is like that of a far distant landscape of memories, and transitional narratives'.
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The figures are sourced from a collective of found images or sometimes a person of interest, they are lucid, imaginary compositions that consist of marks made in the remains of a place -re-invented.
