British-born artist Emma Bell comes from a family of artists. However, she pursued a degree in Business and Marketing from Manchester Metropolitan University. While she painted in her spare time, when she moved from the UK to Atlanta in 2009 with her husband’s job, she took to her brushes and palette knife more permanently.

Emma’s work is influenced predominantly by flowers, as well as by bright, bold and beautiful colors. Her work has developed from a traditional and impressionistic floral style to a more abstract and free format. Whilst creating very loose layers of acrylic, charcoal, oil pastel and graphite on the canvas, her work still holds the shape, texture and form of florals, producing her unique and distinctive style.

“I was greatly influenced as a child by my great-grandmother, who was a landscape painter. I loved to watch her create her Constable-inspired works. I also sat for hours with my grandfather, whose family was very artistic and creative. I can remember sitting in his sunroom sketching the vast hills and meadows and the odd little farmhouse we could see from the windows. We also used to play in the garden and study the flowers. 

I have painted flowers for as long as I can remember; I find them fascinating and utterly beautiful. Flowers have such a huge but fragile significance in life. I feel sad that they live for only a fraction of time. I watch the magnolia tree in my garden bloom and within a day, the once robust, white petals are wilted and tarnishing to a pale brown. I feel the urgency to capture their beauty on a canvas.” – Emma Bell

The exhibition is on display in the Gardenhouse Gallery.