Sue Clayton is a portrait artist with a vibrant colour palette and a social purpose.
Clayton, making a radical change in mid-career to become a self-taught full-time artist, soon saw success with recognition by ‘Britain’s Got Artists’ (2012), and most recently, as ‘Outstanding Visual Artist’ in the York Culture Awards, for her much-admired York Heroes (2017-2018) project. The Exhibition featured among others, legend of the York Theatre Royal pantomime, Berwick Kaler, and animal welfare practitioner, Mary Chapman.
Influenced by Rembrandt, York artist, William Etty, and more contemporary painters like Jenny Saville and Tim Benson, Clayton enjoys working with dynamic colours to make marks ‘that should not be there but somehow work’. As such, her approach to portraits not merely apprehends the likeness of her subjects, but their inner life too.