Nikki Gardham

"We are trained as we grow," Nikki explains, "to look for a route that others have passed through before us." Her works on canvas and paper with their amorphous figures are a reminder that, within our surroundings, we are merely one in a line of passers-by."

Nikki Gardham was born in Essex, and is now living and working in East London. Nikki studied at Cambridge School of Art before attending The Drawing Year at the Royal Drawing School in 2013.

The subject matter of her work implies a human relationship to spaces and draws upon contemporary observations, imagination and folklore. In the studio she takes her work through different processes – drawing / collage / paint – which helps to state the intention of the work more emphatically or allow it to morph and evolve into something new and surprising. Not knowing what will happen means the work needs to be made to find out.

Nikki divides her time between working in her studio in Wapping, and running art engagement workshops in collaboration with some of London most inspiring collections & institutions, including Dulwich Picture Gallery, the Royal Drawing School, Wallace Collection and the V&A.

Image: Nikki Gardham for 8 Holland Street, January 2023