Jude Freeman

‘My earliest recollection is being in a garden surrounded by grass and plants nearly as tall as me. That feeling, a mixture of curiosity and elation still colours my response to nature which I explore through drawing, painting and print. In making work I look to recapture this original vision of my existence within the bigger picture of the natural world. Whether in field studies of butterflies painted on the wing, etchings of native wild flowers, buildings and familiar places, I set out to respond to my environment capturing something in and of the moment.’

Jude was encouraged from an early age to draw and make things, she hails from a Midlands family of craftsworkers and artists. Since studying Rembrandt’s etchings at university she has been fascinated by printmaking and finds that through practice the mysteries of this alchemic medium gradually reveal themselves. More recently she has been exploring silkscreen printing for its painterly possibilities.

Dartmoor has been Jude’s home for twenty years, she works outdoors as much as possible, walking on the moor daily. Flowers and plants are an eternal source of inspiration and joy and through close observation, as with everything, an understanding of our interconnectedness grows. Through this work she seeks to convey something of the miraculous in the apparently mundane, the wonder that can be glimpsed in the everyday world about us.