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Hometown: Tunis Mills, MD

Matthew Hillier was born in the Buckinghamshire village of Farnham Common, which is a stone’s throw from Windsor Castle. His family moved down to West Sussex and he was lucky enough to be brought up in a beach house in a small seaside community called Elmer Sands.

At sixteen Matthew left school to attend Dyfed College Of Art in Carmarthen S.Wales. The College was the first in the country to offer a “Wildlife Illustration Course and  Matthew was the youngest student in the College. He spent three Idyllic years traveling around the Welsh countryside learning to paint Birds and Animals.  He Graduated with distinction.

Before his eighteenth birthday he had three of his paintings accepted by the Royal Academy for its Summer Exhibition.  This was a first, and led to a barrage of publicity, and some very useful early name recognition.

He went on to earn his living as a wildlife artist and illustrator.  Over the next few years he Illustrated many books, magazines, calendars, greetings cards etc, whilst also finding time to have exhibitions of his paintings. He was elected a member of the Society Of Wildlife Artists, as well as being a regular exhibitor in many of the other societies Including The Paris Salon, the Pastel Society and the Society Of Marine Artists.  Over the years he has won many awards all over the World. His Illustration Career culminated in a Commission to Illustrate a large limited edition book called “The Rhinoceros, A Monograph. This commission changed everything. He spent several years traveling around the World  studying four of the five species of Rhinos in their habitat. He was Invited to spend three months in Zimbabwe looking at Black and White Rhinos and spent time in the jungle in Sumatra with ”Torgamba”, a beautiful Sumatran rhino.

He began to work with publishers in the States doing limited edition prints. Whilst working with Mill Pond press he was Invited by the company to spend two years in Florida. During this time he was sent to galleries around the country promoting his prints.  Whilst on a Plein Air painting course in Montana he began dating the artist Julia Rogers. They went on to marry. They have a teenage son Patrick, and two older step children, Matthew and Stephanie.

Hometown: Easton, MD

During her life as a painter, Nancy Tankersley has moved fluidly from portraiture to still life and figurative paintings and finally on to plein air landscapes. “I think it is important for contemporary artists to capture the land and the people as they are today. I do not try to romanticize or invent my subjects, but I do try to show the beauty of the ordinary. People engaged in their occupations, enjoying their leisure time by eating, shopping or just strolling down a street, as well as abandoned and often overlooked landscapes … all of these are ordinary subjects, which can make extraordinary paintings. I try to paint from life as much as possible so that my work has the authenticity that comes from capturing a moment in time.”

The breath of her themes has enabled her to draw what she has learned from each and apply that knowledge with conviction in each painting. In “Still Floating”, Tankersley draws upon her skill with the figure in capturing the gesture of the lone waterman oaring his way to his old moored workboat, checking its hull and lines and making sure she is still afloat. As one can see by the numerous boats that have meet a watery end, this is a task that a good waterman must attend to frequently. I started this painting as a plein air painting, drawn by the light, but ended up adding the figure and placing the half submerged hulls as design elements to encase the lone figure. I’ve always enjoyed capturing the gesture of the figure and especially that of figures at work.” In the past two decades she has explored workers of the restaurant industry, first responders, landscapers, airport workers, dancers and even cowboys!

Her work was recently accepted into the first online International Exhibition of Marine Art which includes the work of artists from US, Canada, the United Kingdom, France and Australia. The artist is represented by the Trippe Gallery in Easton, Maryland; Anderson Gallery in St. Simons, Georgia; and Gallery 330 in Fredricksburg, Texas.

Tankersley enjoys teaching and mentoring other artists and will continue teaching virtually as well as in Portugal, Georgia and Italy. Her instructional DVD’s, Painting Figures from Photographs and Essential Principles of painting, is available through Lillidahl Instructional Videos.