Artists Statement
My research-led practice examines the often overlooked elements of the urban environment, focusing on the shadows that form around monumental building facades and their impact on spatial perception. My work explores how these shadows evoke sensory reactions when interacting with their surrounding materials.
"The shadow gives shape and life to the object in light. It also provides the realm from which fantasies and dreams arise."
— Juhani Pallasmaa, The Eyes of The Skin: Architecture and the Senses
Working in bright, sunlit conditions reminiscent of a Western Australian upbringing, I visit selected architectural sites across the UK and Europe, capturing sharp, expressive silhouettes with a camera and pen. This process can be slow, requiring patient observation as light and shadow interplay, transforming static structures into dynamic visual experiences. Back in the studio, these shadow motifs serve as interchangeable shapes, forming abstract, mixed-media compositions and prints. The addition of archival color references helps reveal the unique intricacies of their host buildings.
Evolving from this process is the creation of three-dimensional forms, represented as modular, multi-part, or flat-pack sculptures in combinations of card, wood, concrete, or Perspex. Singular, interlocking, layered, or stacked, their appearance shifts as light interacts across and through their surfaces, echoing the ephemerality of the original shadows they represent. Experimental printmaking techniques, along with drawn and painted elements, embellish their surfaces—preserving the colors and tactile memory of place while acting as a unique record of atmosphere.
"The shadow is not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be explored."
— Haruki Murakami
Using cutouts, hinges, attachments, and slots, I examine themes of memory, absence and the intangible moments experienced within the built environment. A deep appreciation of Brutalist architecture, the stark allure of British 1940s Film Noir, and the writings of Gernot Böhme, Haruki Murakami, Italo Calvino and J.G. Ballard all infuse and inspire my work.
My current focus is on the concept of "walking shadows"—shadows that seem to wander through liminal spaces, between dreams and reality, the conscious and subconscious, the mundane and the extraordinary—evoking a sense of existential curiosity and estrangement.
About
With a degree in Graphic Design and a PGCE, both from Middlesex University, Wills-Brown has taught Art and Design in London and Oxfordshire schools since 1993.
In 2019 she took a break from teaching and running a busy art department to return to full time education, graduating in 2020 with an MFA in Fine Art (Distinction) from Oxford Brookes University. Wills-Brown works from her home studio just outside Oxford and teaches art part time to teenagers and adults.
She exhibits across the UK as well as internationally and is a member of several artist groups and communities, including ArtCan, Oxford Art Society, Portable Collective and is an associate member of Oxford Printmakers Co-operative.
EDUCATION
2020 – Oxford Brookes University, MFA Fine Art (Distinction)
2018 – Oxford Brookes University, PGCert(Ed) Artist Teacher Scheme (Distinction)
1993 – Middlesex University, PGCE (Secondary) Art and Design
1991 – Middlesex Polytechnic, BA Hons Graphic Design (2:1)
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2020 – Impalpable Shadows. MFA Degree Show (Online and imagined at The Foundry Gallery, London)
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2025 - Mail Art project. A collaboration between H_A_R_D_P_A_I_N_T_I_N_G, Sluice and LungA School, Seyðisfjörður, Iceland, 22 - 25 May
2025 - OAS Members Exhibition. Kendrew Barn Gallery, St John’s College, Oxford, 22nd to 5th April
2024/25 - RWA 171 Annual Open Exhibition, Bristol, 14 September to 5 January
2024 - Oxford Art Society Open Exhibition, The Kendrew Barn Gallery, St John’s College, Oxford, 21 September to 5 Oct
2024 - The Shape of Things To Come, Gallery 475, Fulham Road, London, 21 to 25 May
2024 - Connected III, The Old Fire Station Gallery, Henley-On-Thames, 11 to 15 April
2024 - A Room Of One’s Own, Irving Gallery, Oxford, 2nd March to 5th April
2023 - ING Discerning Eye, The Mall Galleries, 17 to 26 November 2023, and online until the 31 December (Selected by Julian Wild)
2023 - Cymru Gyfoes/Wales Contemporary, Waterfront Gallery, Milford Haven, 21st October to 20th December
2023 - The Creative Network Launch, Saw Swee Hock Student Centre, LSE, London, 6 October
2023 - BOX Bonn/Oxford ARTxCHANGE, Artroom, Windmühlenstraße 9, 52111 Bonn, 3 - 17 September
2023 - INC Print Exchange, Reveal Printmakers, Salford and Magdalen Artists, Oxford, Hot Bed Press Studios, Salford, 31 August - 30 September
2023 - The Power of Pencil. ArtCan Virtual Gallery, 20 March to 22 April
2023 - Oxford Art Society Members’ Exhibition. Kendrew Barn Gallery, St John’s College, Oxford, 18 March to 2 April
2022 - RESTORE. Portable Collective, Cornerstone, Didcot, Nov to 3 Jan 2023
2022 - STORIES 02. KROLL, The News Building, London, July to Feb 2023
2022 - ELEVATE 04. KROLL, The Shard, London, July to Feb 2023
2022 - EXPLORE 01. KROLL Building, New York, April to Feb 2023
2022 - Vienna Calling III, Take a Chance on Me. Galerie ArtPool/Vienna, 9 to 23 September
2022 - FLUX noun [CHANGE]. The Jam Factory, 28th Feb to 24 April
2022 - Raising The Bar. Women in Art CIC online Auction, The Auction Collective, 15 Feb to 18 March
2022 - WINTER. Kingsland Project Space, London, 21st January to 12 February
2022 - FRACTURE! The Old Fire Station, Oxford 19th January to 26th February (PORTABLE Collective, Oxford, inaugural exhibition)
2021 - Twenty, Twenty One. Oxford Brookes MFA Graduate Show, OVADA Gallery, Oxford
2021 – Oxford Art Society Open Exhibition. The Cloister Gallery, Oxford
2021 – Twenty, Twenty One. Oxford Brookes MFA Graduate Show, Oxford Brookes University
2020 – Oxford Art Society Open Exhibition. (Online)
2019/20 – DreaMFActory. An interim exhibition of work by students from the MFA programme, Glass Tank Gallery, Oxford Brookes University, Oxford
2019 – Traces. Nuffield Orthopaedic Hospital, Oxford
2019 – Chromantics. Cornerstone Arts Centre, Didcot
2019 – Transience. Artist Teacher Group, Richard Hamilton Building, Oxford Brookes University, Oxford
AWARDS
2025 - a-n Artists’ Bursary for continued professional practice and creative development
2022/23 - Selected for New Platform Art Professional Development Programme
TALKS
2023 - Art-Sauce, Oxford, The Answers You Get Depend Upon The Questions You Ask. 18 April
2021 - EPOX Primer 03 Live with Jeremy Morgan, 21 July
RESIDENCIES
2021 - Shadow Traces. A month long, self-initiated online residency creating site specific responses to the Denys Wilkinson Building, Oxford
COLLECTIONS
My work is held in collections in The UK, The Netherlands, Austria and Australia.
TEACHING
I have taught art in both state and private schools in Oxfordshire and London, since 1993, including Bentley Wood, Queens College, Wallingford School, Chandlings, Abingdon School and St Clare’s, Oxford, as well as workshops for adults at OVADA Gallery, Oxford.