Gillian Sim - ‘Cow Parsley’

44cm x 58cm

Textile

Gillian grew up in a village on the East Coast of Sutherland in the Scottish Highlands. She has always loved art but, initially, did not follow that career path. After graduating she worked in Glasgow before moving to London to work for the Diplomatic Service. After 10 years, she returned to Scotland and was drawn back to art. Gillian joined local art clubs and completed an Art & Design Portfolio course at college. She then attended the University of Strathclyde’s Centre for Lifelong Learning programme, achieving a Certificate of Higher Education in Creative Arts.

Gillian has always drawn inspiration from the beautiful Scottish landscape and uses this in her textile work with Merino fleece fibres and silks, laying down the fibres in the same way that a painter uses different coloured paints and brushstrokes to create a painting. She usually combines the techniques of wet-felting and needle-felting. The completed process creates a ‘felt painting’. Gillian also enjoys painting in watercolour and acrylic.