Born in England near the Lake District, Janice lived and worked in Germany, Hong Kong, Thailand and back in England before settling in Sydney and the N.S.W. Southern Highlands.

While living in Bangkok, she completed a City & Guild Diploma in Textile Art which was heavily influenced by her travels to neighbouring Cambodia and Laos as well as to the hill tribes in northern Thailand and China, with all their rich traditions of silk weaving.

On returning to live in England, she completed a foundation diploma in Fine Arts at Cheltenham School of Art, and built on that by taking a Bachelor’s degree in Fine Arts at the National Art School in Sydney.

She has exhibited in group and solo shows and her work appears in both private and public collections.

Song of Thalassa

I draw upon the elemental forces of colour, light, water, and air to explore what it means to be human. The sea, both subject and metaphor, moves through my work as a shifting mirror of emotion, memory, and change. In Greek mythology, Thalassa is the primordial goddess of the sea — the source of all life, vast and unknowable, yet deeply nurturing. Her myth resonates with my search to hold the infinite within a single surface, to find stillness within movement, and to express the tension between creation and calm.

Each painting begins without a title or fixed intent. I follow the rhythm of the brush, the pull of colour, allowing the work to unfold in its own time. The titles arrive later, once I sense what the painting wants to reveal. These works are meditations on belonging and impermanence, on the quiet power of nature and the mystery that lies beneath it. I hope they invite contemplation — to leave the viewer touched by that same vastness we feel when standing before a vast ocean. – Janice Liley 2025

Artist Statement

I paint from remembered landscapes that I carry with me. I don’t wish to reproduce what I see in front of me, but merely to try and paint how I feel about a world that inhabits me.

Their inceptions are never clear nor planned, but start life like unarticulated words that hang between the said and the unspoken.

Design is sought in moments of uncertainty, building upon marks that appear from the canvas, brought about by fragments of colour, smells and memories. I have learnt over time to find solace in the confusion and frustration, which at times feels like wearing shoes that slightly pinch, but knowing, trusting that in this flux images will appear without warning or great fanfare; like an old pair of lost jeans, the sight of which brings shy comfort.

Education

2007    Bachelor of Fine Arts, painting major, National Art School, Sydney, Australia
2004    BTEC Diploma, Foundation studies (art & design), University of Gloucester, UK
2002    Creative Studies Part 2, Embroidery Skills, City and Guilds of the London Institute
1995    Creative Studies Part 1, Embroidery Skills, Opus School of Textile Art, London, UK

Exhibitions

2022 Erebus and the Hesperides at Art2Muse Gallery, Woollahra, Sydney
2020 Where Land and Sky Meet at Art2Muse Gallery, Double Bay, Sydney
2019 ‘Hours of the Day – Horis Diei‘ at Art2Muse, Double Bay, Sydney
2017  Coastal Walks at Art2Muse Gallery, Double Bay, Sydney
2016 ‘Caelum’ at Art2Muse Gallery, Double Bay, Sydney
2015  Art2Muse Gallery, Double Bay, Sydney
2014  Depot II Gallery, Dank Street, Sydney
2011  Fort Knox Studio, Bowral, NSW
2009  Defiance Gallery, Sydney
2007  Graduation Show, NAS, Sydney
2006 Drawing Week Cell Block Theatre, NAS, Sydney
2005 Drawing Week, Cell Block Theatre. NAS, Sydney
2004  Graduation Show, University of Gloucester, UK
2003  Hill End Farm Drawing Art Prize Finalist, Broadway, Gloucester, UK
2002  Graduation Show, Museum of London, UK
2001  Textile Art Exhibition, Ascot, UK
2000 Textile Art Exhibition, Harrogate, UK
1995 Graduation Show, Bedford Collect, Regent’s Park, London UK

Media

2010 Country Style Magazine, Jan
2009 Country Style Magazine, Nov
2009 Inside Out Magazine, Nov/Dec
2004 The Encyclopaedia of Machine Embroidery, Val Holmes, Batford, UK

Collections

Private: Australia. UK. USA. Germany
Public: Australia. St Vincent’s Hospital. Sydney

Awards

2006 St Vincent’s Hospital Award
2003  Hill End Farm Drawing Art Prize Finalist, Broadway, Gloucester, UK