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Overview
Catherine Anholt, a painter and illustrator lives and works in Devon, UK
Education
1978 Foundation, Oxford
1979-1982 BA Hons Fine Art , Falmouth Cornwall (First Class Honours)
1982-1985 MA Royal College of Art
Catherine Anholt works in studios above the sea in Devon, South West England. She was born in 1958, one of eight siblings in an Irish Catholic family. “My mother was a nurse and my father a potter. We lived in a tiny village, surrounded by fields and hills so life was pretty simple.” It was in this rural setting that Catherine’s creativity took root – from a very early age, she began to work freely in highly colorful sketchbooks, a habit which has continued unbroken to the present day.
Catherine gained a First Class Honours degree in Fine Art at Falmouth School of Art, Cornwall. She then moved to London and took a Master’s Degree at the Royal College of Art, where she was offered the Rome Scholarship.
In 1984 she married her husband, Laurence, also an artist with an MA from The Royal Academy in London. Her first daughter was born in 1984, followed by twins three years later. “Our focus then was on providing for the children, so Laurence and I moved into the world of children’s publishing and began to create picture books.”
Over the last 25 years, the Anholts have written and illustrated more than 200 highly successful children’s books, which are published in 30 languages around the world and have won numerous awards. Throughout these years Catherine has continued to work in her studio on hundreds of large fluid drawings and paintings, which, until now, she has shared only with family and friends. Her themes are pregnancy, childbirth and a love of family and nature.
Catherine is now dedicating herself to her Fine Art work. “I am incredibly excited about the prospect of rebuilding this side of my life, which is my true passion. I still take a childlike pleasure in the exploratory process of creating art. Ever since I can remember, painting has been a door into my own world.”