LOU DUNIPACE
ENCOUNTERS
“ Whether I am painting in the imposing highlands or the bridge of a delicate nose my response is rooted in observation. Recently, I’ve embraced the slightly sculptural element in my work, where light bounces between lanes of colour building up layers of oil paint, working building up layers of oil paint, from this transparent glazes to think impasto marks.”
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Lou Dunipace is a British artist known for her expressive landscapes and nuanced use of colour, capturing fleeting moments of atmosphere and light. Preferring to work, in oil, en plein air, Dunipace thrives on the unpredictability of nature, finding inspiration in the changing elements. “My initial starting point is rooted in observation, responding directly in colour”, she says, explaining how her work then transforms from direct observation to something more abstract and evocative back in the studio. Whether painting in the dramatic highlands, the coastal paths of Cornwall or the bustling energy of Marrakesh, she allows her compositions to evolve organically, distilling the landscape into dynamic shapes and bold colour patterns.
"I get excited when the sky transitions from a peaceful, calm state into something more dynamic and intense” she notes, relishing the challenge of capturing the moment when a storm rolls in or when the light shifts, revealing new tones and textures. Her palette is often dramatic, pairing acidic greens against purple skies or using rich teal hues to evoke a place's mood. While deeply rooted in observation, Dunipace’s work moves beyond mere depiction, aiming to convey the emotional essence of a landscape.
Her journey from studying fine art, specialising in textural printmaking and then working as a decorative artist reveals a deep understanding of surface textures and mark-making. As a painter now working in oil, she moves between direct impasto marks and transparent glazes. These experiences translate into her practice today with a balance of precision and spontaneity, creating works that sit on the threshold between repression and abstraction.
Explorations of Morocco are new to her current body of work, and she feels she’s just begun to scratch the surface of it. But wherever her travels take her, Dunipace’s paintings are unified by a vibrant response to place, time, and the interplay of light.
Hester Baldwin, Managing Director, 2024
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Lou Dunipace (b. 1972) is a British artist whose paintings are characterised by an acute observation of surface texture and mark. Moving between tight brushwork in an area of focus and free flowing gestures that capture the surrounding atmosphere, her work tends towards the expressionistic. Her paintings amplify moments of human encounter: a reckoning with the landscape, often created en plein air, or through the intimacy of portraiture.
Born in Northamptonshire, Dunipace holds a Masters Degree in Fine Art from Bristol, where she majored in printmaking. Incorporating numerous techniques from embossing and lithograph to collagraph plates made from found materials. Dunipace’s abiding interest in the transformative power of mark making, combined with a capacity for close observation began early whilst studying Fine Art in Barcelona.
After graduation Dunipace apprenticed to Bernard Bates and Eric Rawlins, Northamptonshire decorative artists who specialised in the paint effects and surface finishes. during this formative period she studied the surface character of building materials, close painterly work emulation luxuries finishes. Dunipace learnt to conjure new surfaces on old: Tinos marble out of plywood, the knotted eyes of burr walnut on MDF, jointed stonework or freshly set plaster on tired painted walls. her process was transformation; the painted overlay disguising what lay beneath, and enhancing its perceived value.
Starting a family and returning to Northamptonshire in 2008 marked the start of an exciting new direction in both subject and practice for Dunipace: intentionally breaking free from the strict language of decoration. Yet a knowledge of patterns, where a line should curve or a repeat will organically manifest, underscores Dunipace’s painting practice today. What has changed is the space she creates and the depth she gives to her subject, which is representative of the artist finding a place for her own point of view – her voice – within the work.
