Natalie Papamichael
CONTEMPORARY FIGURATIVE ARTIST
My Oil Paintings reference my studies in Art History and feminism. I use the techniques of the old masters, working on each painting over an extended period of time.
My acrylics consist of self-portraits, and portraits of family and friends, painted from photographs in everyday settings. These acrylics are technically flowing and quick to create.
Natalie Papamichael is a figurative artist whose paintings and drawings emerge from a dialogue between her personal experiences and her study of art history, psychoanalysis and feminism.
Raised in England by a French mother and Greek father, she moved to Paris in her early twenties where she started painting and exhibiting work. In 1996, she returned to London to study Fine Art at Central Saint Martins. Subsequently, she became involved with the Women’s Art Library, researching feminist performance artists of the 1970’s and creating her own performances. She went on to study an MA in Art History at the Courtauld Institute of Art, where she explored the exclusion of women from academic training and received art history. Combining this research with her own studio practice, she travelled to Florence to learn classical painting techniques.
Inspired by female artists from seventeenth-century Baroque painter, Artemisia Gentileschi, to contemporary photographer, Anna Gaskell, she is self-trained in the tradition of the academic model. Initially recreating work by women artists, she has gone on to develop new narratives in her painting practice using masquerade, performance and self-portraiture.
She has exhibited with Shape Arts and has spoken about her practice and process in relation to feminist art history as part of ‘InPractice’ at the Royal Academy of Arts, London and ‘Share Art’ at Pallant House Gallery in Chichester. She currently lives and works in Brighton.
For further enquires please fill out the contact form.
CURRICULUM VITAE
Born in 1971
Qualifications and Training
2007 Angel Academy of Art, Intensive Painting course, Florence
2007 MA History of Art, Courtauld Institute of Art, London
2002 BA Fine Art (Hons), Central Saint Martins College of Fine Art, London
Solo Exhibitions
2003 Herstory, Brighton Fringe Festival, Brighton
1994 Paintings from L’Hôpital Sainte-Anne, Finnegans Wake, Paris
Group Exhibitions
2016 This is my life, curated by Shape Arts, The Embassy Theater, Skegness
2016 Phoenix Open, Phoenix, Brighton
2014 Shape Gallery, Stratford, London
2013 Shape at Liberty Festival, London
2013 Shape in the City, Pop Up Gallery, London
2012 Civil Partnerships, University of Brighton, Brighton
2010 Dream Home, Phoenix, Brighton
2010 Phoenix Open, Phoenix, Brighton
2009 Phoenix Open, Phoenix, Brighton
2003 Chixx, Tavistock Theater, London
2001 Foreign Bodies, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London
2001 Women Artists, People Show, London
2001 Tinted Spectacles, The Stephen Lawrence Gallery, London
Other
2016 InPractice at the Royal Academy, Royal Academy of Arts, London
2016 Share Art, Pallant House Gallery, Chichester
2015 InPractice at the Royal Academy, Royal Academy of Arts, London
2013 Jensen, Olu, Revolting Doubles: Radical Narcissus and the Trope of Lesbian Doppelgangers, Journal of Lesbian Studies,
17:3-4, 344-364.
2012 Civil Partnerships Forum, University of Brighton, Brighton
2010 Interview, Radio Reverb, Brighton
2002 MAKE the magazine of Women’s Art, Online Graduate Review, London
2001 Intern, Women’s Art Library, London
2018 Muse, Model or Mistress? Gallery Different, London
2018 Summer Showcase Gallery Different, London
2019 Phoenix Open, Phoenix, Brighton