French Pollards

Born in 1950, Cheryll has painted all her life. She did her Foundation at Northwich School of Art, Cheshire 1966 to 68 then St Martins School of Art, London for her BA degree 1968 to 1971.

31 years in London, 12 years in Connemara, Ireland, 6 years in Toulon, Cote d’Azure and 9 years in Devon. In Ireland she ran a small private Art School where she taught Oil Painting and Watercolour to mature and young pupils whilst continuing her practise as a painter of portraits, landscapes and trees.

She has been ‘writing’ icons for 22 years and giving workshops for 15 of those. Cheryll has had many commissions for icons, including one for Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury. He commissioned an icon of Mary Magdalene  for Magdalene College Chapel, Cambridge.


“My work is as varied as the mood takes me, often mistaken for the creations of multiple artists. I put this down to my peripatetic life. Now in my 70’s, the restlessness may be slowing but the work still flows through its various forms.

The Landscapes, usually featuring trees and their shadows are postcards or diary pieces recording my movements, country to country. Connemara had few or no trees, rather like Dartmoor but trees can be found, like Wistman’s Wood, whose twisted forms are other worldly.

Toulon gave intense shadows in the fierce heat and ghostly trees parched in the sun, slowly returning to dust.

Iconography is a later adventure and after 20 years of rigid adherence to the process I have started incorporating my love of portraiture with the spirituality of the icon.

My aim is to merge the two worlds together, weaving the visible and the invisible into one sacred space.”

Oil on Canvas

80x80cm

Framed in an open frame