MUNTHE ART MONDAY: 
ROBYN PACKHAM

Please introduce yourself and tell us about what you do.

 I am a British artist and musician currently based in Herefordshire. In 2023, I joined the Turps Studio Programme in London, where I painted for two years alongside studies at the Royal Drawing School. Through painting, I construct imagined scenes that move between observation, memory, and myth. My practice is rooted in drawing in sketchbooks from both life and imagination, which I later develop into paintings that explore the relationship between the natural and built environment and a more symbolic or spiritual realm.

Could you explain more about how being a woman has affected your career?
 
It has directly influenced the work I make and the images I create. My recent paintings centre on women and the intimate bond between mothers and daughters. My mother was an artist, so through painting it feels as though I am maintaining a connection to her. This gives a sense of vulnerability to my work, which in turn becomes its strength.

Can you name some other female (artist) that inspires you and explain why they do so?

I am deeply inspired by Käthe Kollwitz for the emotional intensity and humanity in her work, and by Paula Rego for the way she transformed personal and psychological narratives into powerful visual language. I also admire Louise Bourgeois, whose exploration of memory, motherhood, and the body resonates strongly with my own themes. Their work feels uncompromising and emotionally honest, and each of them created deeply personal worlds through their art, which is something I continually aspire to in my own practice.

What has been the most challenging aspect of being a woman in the arts?

The lack of women artists being taught in school curriculums was one of the first challenges I encountered growing up. From a young age, I became acclimatised to the idea that being a woman artist was somehow different, and that it often meant sacrificing something else. My mother, for example, was told at art school that if she wanted to be a “serious artist,” she should not have children — as though women must preserve their youth and beauty to remain interesting. That way of thinking bleeds through generations and leaves young female artists feeling pressure to constantly prove themselves for fear of not being taken seriously.

What would you like people to notice in your artwork?

Mirrors and windows frequently appear in my work as symbolic thresholds between interior and exterior worlds. Domestic spaces, clothing, and textiles are often decorated with organic patterns drawn from folklore and fragments of memory, situating imagined scenes within a specific emotional and temporal landscape.

I am interested in the symbolism and folklore associated with plants, and drawing upon allegorical themes of mortality, womanhood, and identity, as well as stories about our place within the natural world. I am interested in illuminating transient moments between people and nature, and in gathering observations and memories that can be transformed into imagined spaces.

My compositions often portray multiple timeframes and perspectives, navigating the boundary between the physical world and that which lies beyond it. Motifs such as reflections, paired canvases, and repetitions between paintings create a subtle sense of “doubling,” acting as windows into an ephemeral world that questions what is true and what is imagined, felt, or believed.

I hope viewers notice the tension between realism and abstraction, structure and emotion, and perhaps find space within the work for their own memories, associations, and interpretations.