This Northumberland Artist, Photographer and Interior Designer is an RHS Gold Medal Winner
Northumberland-based artist and photographer Juliette Scott won a gold medal at the RHS Botanical Art & Photography Show at the Saatchi Gallery this year
Tell us about yourself and your background.
I grew up in Sussex and was always ‘arty’. I was forever drawing and colouring as a child and I taught myself how to do italic writing when I was 12 as I just loved pens, ink and paint! My father worked in horticulture so we were lucky to have a beautiful garden and we also spent time visiting other gardens which is why I now have a genuine love of flowers and trees. I read History of Art at university and subsequently worked at Bonhams auction house in London. Married life took me north and I enrolled on the long-distance learning course run by KLC School of Design. I had my own interior design company for many years and worked on both residential and commercial projects in Northumberland. I designed all the bedrooms and the restaurant and bar area at The Duke Of Wellington Inn in Newton, the President’s Lounge at The Falcons, a private box at NUFC, and had the privilege of working on many private homes too.
How did you get into photography/art?
I had studied A Level Art at school and I had always enjoyed taking snapshots on holiday and photos of our children. However I didn’t think about properly learning photography until just over 10 years ago. I booked with a friend to go on a photography workshop in Morocco and we had an amazing teacher and I came home thinking I really want to do more of this, and learn as much as I can.
Can you describe your creations and the inspiration for them?
My inspiration generally comes from nature or from architecture or landscapes when travelling. Sometimes I am happy to capture exactly what I am seeing but more often than not I just use what I am seeing or feeling as a starting point. I will then develop this initial idea until I have created an image that I am happy with. The wonderful thing about creative photography is that there aren’t any rules that I feel I have to adhere to, I can change the colours, create composites or collages and generally have fun. Typically I print onto matt fine art papers but I have also printed onto metal, which provides very interesting results.
How do you create your work?
I use a Fujifilm X-T4 for my photography, which is a mirrorless camera, and although I have quite a few lenses I tend to just use my three favourites – a macro lens for close ups, and a couple of different zoom lenses. My camera has the capacity to take multiple exposures, in fact it can take up to nine. It also has different blend mode options built within the camera. So, as well as taking traditional images, I can make double or triple exposures which opens up all sorts of opportunities. I can also change my white balance to create interesting effects and move my camera on purpose to create intentional blur. However, often I take just straight shots without doing anything particularly fancy in camera. A big part of my photography is also the post-processing – what I do digitally with my files on my computer when I am back in my studio. The options are endless and hugely exciting.
What have been some of your favourite pieces to create?
I do have a soft spot for the Magic of Marbling collection of images, which combine the hand-marbled papers I made with my photography. I loved the idea of bringing two different art forms together. I learnt the endangered art of paper marbling a few years ago and I have a large collection of papers to work with. It was a really fun series to put together. I always get totally absorbed in whatever I am working on but I love commissions and I also love hand-finishing some of my prints with metal leaf. I don’t apply metal leaf to all my work but on certain pieces it really offers that extra layer of texture and interest. Also metal leaf doesn’t just come in gold and silver, it is available in several wonderful colours. It is fiddly to apply, but worth the time and effort to create something truly bespoke.
What’s it like working in Northumberland?
I feel very lucky to live in such a beautiful part of the country with plenty of inspiration at my fingertips. We have such big skies and lovely light for so much of the time. I think that today with lots of art being sold online as well as in actual galleries it doesn’t matter if you live in the countryside rather than in a city. I sell through several online galleries and I think that the majority of artists also make the most of this option.
What does the future hold for you?
There is always more to learn with photography, and I am very excited to be going back to Venice for a photography workshop early in 2025. It will be exciting to see what pieces come out of that. I certainly aim to carry on learning and developing my photographic art for as long as I can.
