Belinda Ireland studied Fine Art Painting at the Central School of Art and Design under the tutelage of Cecil Collins, David Haughton and John Copnall. After a vivid early life in Singapore she spent her childhood in rural Devon, roaming the countryside, building dens, and developing her love of the imaginary, the themes of which form the basis of her practice. After working with artists such as Robert Lenkiewicz, it was her participation in the 2018 Mentoring Programme at Newlyn School of Art which enabled Belinda to fully realise her painting pathway. Belinda currently paints from her studio south of Dartmoor. She has been longlisted for the Royal Academy Summer shows, and recently exhibited at the 2024 Pastel Society Open at Mall Galleries, London.
Belinda’s painting is concerned with the interior life of the world around her, influenced by the concept of what remains unspoken in a painting, as expressed by Hanneke Grootenboer in her book ‘The Pensive Image’. Her subject matter is curated from a mixture of the tangible such as film, magazines, art history, and the intangible – emotions, events, music, a conversation. Her images evolve through drawing, cutting out and assembling. The subjective use of colour is an integral part of each painting, adding to the emotional mood of the image, as is the use of light, the power of which was originally inspired by Rembrandt’s handling of light from his painting ‘Philosopher in Meditation’.