Lisa Hooper was born in Hampshire and has lived in north east Essex, mid Wales, Gloucestershire and Dumfries and Galloway where she has now settled...
The turning point in my artistic development came in 1992 when I joined an evening class in etching at what is now the University of Gloucestershire. Over successive years my commitment to printmaking grew and in 1998 I bought my own press. I became a full time artist in 2006 when I moved to Port William, in South West Scotland, following redundancy.
Career highlights:
- 1999, significant sale to the Nuffield Foundation followed by an AA2A award to spend 100 hours in Art College studios.
- 2007 solo exhibition at the Wildfowl and Wetlands HQ, Slimbridge (followed in 2011 by a second exhibition).
- 2007 winner of the Birds, Birds, Birds prize for the most innovative exhibit at the National Exhibition of Wildlife Art (NEWA) on the Wirral.
- 2008 winner of the Birds Illustrated prize for the most outstanding piece of avian artwork also at NEWA.
- Regular exhibitor at the SWLA’s Natural Eye, (open exhibition) at the Mall Galleries, London
- Contributor to Wildlife in Printmaking, published in 2012 by the Langford Press
- Solo exhibitions at the Scottish Ornithologist’s Club HQ at Aberlady in 2012, 2014, 2016, 2018 and 2023
- Visual Arts Award to study Japanese Woodblock printing at Edinburgh Printmakers (Summer school) 2012
- Residencies at Nature in Art, Gloucestershire, 2012, 2014 and 2017
- Artist in Residence at the East Neuk Festival, 2013
- Winner of the British Wildlife in Art Award at NEWA, 2014
- My own book, First Impressions, was published by the Langford Press in August 2014
- https://www.amazon.co.uk/Elegant-Fowl-Printmakers-Parliament-Owls/dp/099299148XContributor to The Artful Hare, published in 2015 by the Mascot Press and subsequently to the Little Chicken, The Elegant Fowl, Norfolk Gems and Wings over Water by the same publisher
- Winner of the Artist Magazine Award at the David Shepherd Wildlife Artist of the Year exhibition 2015 (Mall Galleries, London). Also Highly Commended overall
- Published a second book in the Langford Press Technical series called Printing Wildlife (in hardback and softback)
- Winner of the Langford Press Printmaking award, 2017 at the Society of Wildlife Artists’ exhibition, The Natural Eye at the Mall Galleries, London
- Winner of the Dry Red Press Printmakers award at The Natural Eye, 2019.
- Elected Associate Member of the Society of Wildlife Artists, October 2019 and full Member in October 2022
- Worked with the South of Scotland Golden Eagle Project during 2020 on a commissioned promotional poster
- Produced nine Bird images to accompany poet Ken Cockburn’s work during his 2019 Wigtown Writer’s Residency called, ‘Where are the birds taking me?’. The 2020 Wigtown Book Festival and the 2021 STanza Poetry Festival (both online events) both featured the joint presentation
- Took part in online exhibitions with the SWLA and the SOC during 2020
- Illustrations used in the 2020 North Ronaldsay Observatory Bird report and provided the cover image for the 2019 and 2020 Dumfries and Galloway Bird Reports. Contributed to the BTOs book, “Into the Red”, a celebration by writers and artists of the UK’s most endangered birds.
- Exhibited solo at the Maclaurin Gallery, Ayr, September to November 2021
- Solo exhibitions a The Scottish Ornithologists’ club and the Bonhoga Gallery Shetland in April and September 2023 respectively
- Exhibited with the South West Scotland Printmakers outwith the region in 2024 and with DAGFAS.
- Commissioned to produce book covers for the Fair Isle Bird Observatory Trust for its new Birds of Fair Isle which is due to be published this Autumn 2025
- Artist in Residence at the Society of Wildlife Artist’s Massingham Heath Project; a project focusing on regenerative farming which will culminate in a book celebrating the wildlife of the Heath and the SWLA artists’ responses to it (August 2025).
- Very good selections of my work are always available at the Gallery at Laurieston near Castle Douglas, the Ochre Gallery in Gatehouse of Fleet and the Birdscapes Gallery in Glandford, Norfolk. I also have work at Cambridge Contemporary Arts, the Jetty Gallery in Oban, the Waterfront Gallery in Stromness (Orkney), Oliver Contemporary in Wandsworth and the Bonhoga Gallery in Shetland (work in the Mareel during refurbishment).
