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pattern and painting
Delpha with Roses and other phantoms at Porthmeor studios 2022. Photo credit: Pete Knight

Artist’s Statement

Art making is a means of reconnecting the alternative values of past cultures to the present, and addressing issues of resistance, sustainability, and economies of care.

I use painting as a way of thinking through complex systems with multiple and entangled narratives. My tapestry-like ‘history’ paintings use a vernacular of interpretable figures, colours, symbols and patterns to tell stories about women’s lives. Assimilating mythologies from the past and realising them in a language of the present explores empathy and what we value now.

Idealised and fluid female archetypes satirise hierarchies in which women have so often been absent. They are surrounded by surreal landscapes and domestic patterns that heave with carnivalesque hybrid figures, patterns and symbols that create new fictions and polyphonic stories that create relatable and transformative experience.

Painting installations combine painting with found objects, including local granite egg stones and domestic furniture. Performance and film works use reflexive processes of embodiment in local landscapes as a vehicle to empower and connect. Visual storytelling creates equality, visibility and value for women’s bodily experiences of mothering and caring for the natural world.

Delpha Hudson, March 2024

patterned painted chair installation
Grandma’s Story, painting installation with found object and acrylic on linen, 2024

The latest art work is a rescued a chair that has been made into an interactive project. Everyone is invited to sit in the chair and read stories out loud or to yourself. All stories are original re-versioning of old tales, myths and stories about women.

colourful figurative painting

A common treasury for all, acrylic on canvas, 200x180cm, 2023

painting about collectivity and care
Infinitely boundless as the human heart, acrylic on canvas, 210x160cm, 2023

contemporary figurative painting
Creatures that tip the scales in our favour, acrylic on canvas, 210x170cm, 2023

When you’ve been around so long you are goddess of many things, Tremenheere Gallery, April 2023

painting for sale
In the soup, acrylic on canvas, 190x165cm, 2022

painting for sale
The monsters that make us, mixed media on canvas, 200x160cm, 2022

painting for sale
The sixth sense of understanding, acrylic on canvas, 200x180cm, 2021

painting with female knight doing contemporary cleaning
Standard bearer, mixed media on canvas, 195x160cm, 2022

Multi-media works include sculpture, performance and film

performing in the landscape
Performance collaborations with Helen Sargeant at the Men-an-tol, June 2023

patterned painted chair installation
Grandma’s Story, painting installation with found object and acrylic on linen, 2024

Paintings in oil and bitumen paint or watercolour and ink

delpha hudson painting for sale
She wanted to swim through the broadest of lives, oil & bitumen on canvas, 50x50x4cm, 2020

colourful painting
White rhino, black rhino, mixed media on canvas, 90x30x4cm, 2019

watercolour painting of rocks and woman
Seeing through and being seen, watercolour, 42x30cm, 2023

paintings on paper
The price of truth (whose truth?) 42x30cm, watercolour and ink, 2023

writing painting
Family on a tight rope, watercolour & ink, 42x30cm, 2022


artist in her studio
Delpha at Porthmeor Studios, 2022. Photo film credit: Pete Knight

Watch a film of Delpha talking about her work