A Shape in the Forest - Helen Minns

About

Helen works across painting, drawing and printmaking. These recent works explore the relationship between landscape, memory and abstraction, inspired by daily walks through local nature reserves and urban woodlands, including Nunhead Cemetery and One Tree Hill. Through observation and imagination Helen traces a journey between the natural and the invented world. Shapes and surfaces evolve through layering, improvisation and the quiet unpredictability of mark-making. The forest, in particular, has become a metaphor for the creative process itself - constantly shifting, shaped by the unseen, and alive with hidden energies. These pieces capture something of the state: half-mapped, half-discovered, alive with gesture and texture. Rather than presenting finished landscapes, the work invites viewers into a space of becoming - a reflection of both the seen environment and the inner terrain of memory and imagination.