Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten, after Arvo Part (detail) oil and sparkly bits on canvas, 91x61cm (36x24")
CHRIS HOLLEY: Statement
With a dance/choreographic background and music in her DNA, Chris is an abstract/figurative painter working mainly from memory and imagination. Her rhythmical and expressive paintings are underpinned by strong drawing skills and sure sense of line and much of her visual art resides where the arts intersect. No surprise then, that she studied Diaghilev's Ballets Russes' astonishing impact across all the arts, her writings on this absorbing subject now residing in the National Library of Art in London's Victoria and Albert Museum and with major arts bodies here and overseas. She exhibits regularly in London and south England, her art also adorning walls in collections in the USA, Portugal and Spain.
Working mainly in acrylic and oil plus household emulsion, Chris creates small to large scale paintings, often bypassing brushes in favour of sponges, cloths, sticks and her hands/fingers, plus studio artifacts, to make the less expected mark. Disliking the confines of a set-size canvas, she cuts canvas from a roll, primes it in sections and then paints on it unstretched - this in good company with Jackson Pollock. Only later will she crop the image to exact size and selected area to commit to stretcher bars and the finished painting.
Following a leading role in multi-disciplinary project Feeling the Beat at South Hill Park Arts Centre, Bracknell, she continues to actively seek and welcome opportunities and involvement fusing the arts. In 2025 she was visual artist in residence at renowned Bangor Music Festival. This comprised a solo Music the Muse exhibition of twenty-eight abstract music paintings and a concert in which music written by composers inspired by eleven of her paintings was premiered. The finale was her performance-painting live in-the-moment canvases in response to music premieres as they were performed for the audience. 2025 also saw her guesting with multi-arts collective Noisy Women Present and, in 2026 she is due to work as visual artist with music students of the University of East London.
With a dance/choreographic background and music in her DNA, Chris is an abstract/figurative painter working mainly from memory and imagination. Her rhythmical and expressive paintings are underpinned by strong drawing skills and sure sense of line and much of her visual art resides where the arts intersect. No surprise then, that she studied Diaghilev's Ballets Russes' astonishing impact across all the arts, her writings on this absorbing subject now residing in the National Library of Art in London's Victoria and Albert Museum and with major arts bodies here and overseas. She exhibits regularly in London and south England, her art also adorning walls in collections in the USA, Portugal and Spain.
Working mainly in acrylic and oil plus household emulsion, Chris creates small to large scale paintings, often bypassing brushes in favour of sponges, cloths, sticks and her hands/fingers, plus studio artifacts, to make the less expected mark. Disliking the confines of a set-size canvas, she cuts canvas from a roll, primes it in sections and then paints on it unstretched - this in good company with Jackson Pollock. Only later will she crop the image to exact size and selected area to commit to stretcher bars and the finished painting.
Following a leading role in multi-disciplinary project Feeling the Beat at South Hill Park Arts Centre, Bracknell, she continues to actively seek and welcome opportunities and involvement fusing the arts. In 2025 she was visual artist in residence at renowned Bangor Music Festival. This comprised a solo Music the Muse exhibition of twenty-eight abstract music paintings and a concert in which music written by composers inspired by eleven of her paintings was premiered. The finale was her performance-painting live in-the-moment canvases in response to music premieres as they were performed for the audience. 2025 also saw her guesting with multi-arts collective Noisy Women Present and, in 2026 she is due to work as visual artist with music students of the University of East London.