angela harding
Flights of fancy
Based in the aptly-named Midlands village of Wing, Angela Harding has developed her visual interest in birds into a successful and imaginative
career in paint, print and illustration WORDS: MARTHA ALEXANDER PHOTOS: PAUL HURST
turned professional in 2008. She had continued to produce work since her student days in the early 1980s, but this was the first time that she was able to concentrate on her own work every day. “It took me a while to find my voice,” says the Midlands-based artist, explaining that her elder sister had gone to the Slade at 17. “I didn’t want to follow that limelight, so I did a pre-nursing course instead, determined to go in a different direction.” However, as she was to discover, when you are
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passionate about something it will find a way into your life regardless. Angela eventually began a painting degree at Leicester College and spent most of her time in the print room. “I found I really loved printmaking,”
she recalls. “I wasn’t a typical student. I lived in a little cottage in Melton Mowbray and cycled into college. I was obsessively drawing, not partying. Once
I started on the printmaking, I couldn’t stop.” Angela is a paradox: she’s single-minded about
her art – “it’s part of who I am and something I have always done even if it’s not been for money” – but at the same time open-minded about how and where it could take her. After college, she demonstrated copperplate engraving
techniques at the Gladstone Pottery Museum, before spending 18 months in Bangladesh volunteering in a rehabilitation centre for patients with spinal injuries doing craft development. Upon her return, she co- founded the Leicester Print Workshop and became artist-in-residence at Uppingham School, setting up the print studio there. A part-time MA in Fine Art followed in the early 1990s after her daughter was born and she taught at degree level with De Montfort University and Stamford College. The last job she took before turning professional was
as an art consultant for a cruise ship, working with 80 artists – including the likes of Elizabeth Blackadder, whose designs were made into a tapestry for the ship. As part of the job, Angela regularly travelled to Venice where the ship was being built and kept an eye on the artists whose work was selected for display onboard. Although Angela gave up her own practice completely
for a while, she saw the experience as a sort of apprenticeship. “Exploring other types of art, the practical problems of using site specific things, commercial issues and seeing other artists at work in their studios taught me a lot but it also made me want to get back into my own practice.” Throughout it all, she kept sketchbooks filled with
thick, assertive spidery lines that playfully and hysterically documented her life. The books are full to the brim and although they are merely sketches, they leave her natural skill as an artist in no doubt. During her time as an art consultant, Angela saved up enough
LEFT Angela in the studio with Syd, her lurcher OPPOSITE PAGE Three Eggs and Goldcrest, acrylic on canvas, 30x40cm
Artists & Illustrators 13
s so many artists can probably testify, it is a long and difficult transition training to reaching a point at which you can make a living from your art. Painter-printmaker Angela Harding
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