Victoria’s love for art started from an early age; her grandma - an artist, introduced her to oil-painting at the age of 9, creating her first painting - of a bird; this would come full circle years later.

Alongside art, Victoria has long held interests in environmental science and biology, having studied it prior to design and art and sustaining an interest in scientific illustration, after winning first-place in the national science fair prize for biological drawing as a school child.

Growing up, she helped her father grow native plants and restore local native bush, formative experiences which highlighted to her the importance of conservation and the connection between people and the environment.

Victoria’s early work primarily began in portraiture; as a child she won a TV-run national kids’ portrait competition. Victoria’s initial influences were her grandma, Joan Miles’ work and the old masters such as Da Vinci. This led to a series of colourful icon portraits, one of which won the People’s Choice Award for the National Youth Art Awards.

Drawing inspiration from travel, she became fascinated with the sense of sublime and the transitory play of light in landscape painting. This developed into an interest in tonalism and the Hudson River School, whose artists portrayed nature as sublime, divine spaces, which encouraged conservation and influenced the eventual creation of national parks.

This confluence of experiences and influences has led Victoria into her next era of paintings, the realm of New Zealand landscapes and its inhabitants… watch this space.