ABOUT ME

I AM NOT CAROLINE LAMB by CAROLYN LAMB. 2014 . Oil on canvas. 20 x 25.5cm. People often do not realise that Carolyn and Caroline are different names. It is doubly difficult when your full name closely resembles someone more famous. I used this portrait sitting to get both of us into one painting. I am thinking about years of having to correct people about my name which is why I look grumpy.

I AM NOT CAROLINE LAMB.    Double Portrait: Lady Caroline Lamb by Sir Thomas Lawrence (c.1820) and Carolyn Lamb self portrait (2014). 
I painted this oil from life in the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery painting store. I used a mirror to reflect myself sitting in front of the original oil portrait of the infamous Lady Caroline Lamb, lover of Lord Byron, which hangs on the racks behind me.
The wooden exhibition transit crate behind my head represents my career as painting conservator at Bristol Museums, Libraries and Archives in Bristol where I live.  I completed this just before leaving my job  to concentrate more on my own painting.

Carolyn Lamb restoring 'View from the Mendips' by J.B.Pyne (K159 Bristol Museum and Art Gallery). Watercolour by Rachel Hemming Bray, 1993. www.rachelhemmingbray.co.uk

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I was born in Scotland and originally trained in Fine Art on the joint Honours degree course run by Edinburgh University and Edinburgh College of Art. Further training at the Tate Gallery and Courtauld Institute of Art as a painting conservator led to an arts career restoring paintings alongside my work as an artist.

I like to capture the world I see, so I paint directly from nature. Oil paintings of cliffs , gardens and town and country corners ( L to R): Willapark near Tintagel, Hendre Ddu, Hendre Ddu Slate Mine, and The Severn Bridge at Chepstow.

 I use a variety of art materials.  I prefer painting in oils, but also use watercolours, acrylics, drawing media, print-making (etchings) - whatever seems right at the time.

Oil paint box

Watercolour sketching set

My outdoor studio