Louise McBride

My name is Louise McBride and I am a pastel artist from Ayr. I spend most of my time working on local landscape and seascape pieces but I am also interested in portraiture and hope to spend more time on this in the future. I regularly undertake commissioned work too which, as well as landscapes, often includes scenes involving people, pets or landmarks.

I originally studied Visual Communication at Glasgow School of Art, between 1999 – 2003, where I specialised in photography. I continue to have an interest in photography as I capture all of my own reference photos, albeit on a smartphone these days.

I have been using pastels almost exclusively for a few years now and I am mostly self-taught in this medium. I continue to learn with each project and seek to develop my skill.

Most recently I have been working on a series of pastel paintings that I have titled ‘From a different place’. These are based on reference photos I had taken of the area around the Ayrshire coast where I live, whilst taking my daily exercise during lockdown. I am now looking forward to capturing the transition from autumn to winter and the changes this will bring to my colour palette.