Catherine Goodman

Catherine Goodman lives and works in London, UK. Central to her artistic process is the act of drawing from observation, whether from life, objects or works by the great masters. Goodman describes how her preparatory drawings, in charcoal, gouache and pencil, become ‘the armature or the scaffold of every piece of work.’ For over thirty years, she has drawn every single day.

She says, ‘drawings hold the smells and the bones, memories, feelings and the structure of everything I do.’ Her visual language runs across genres, and the influence of literature, cinematography, music and drawing from art and life, enriches her work. Goodman has developed her own subtle mythology, the motifs of which carry through her drawings and paintings, whether of real or imagined characters and landscapes. Although she is best known for portraiture, Goodman’s practice includes expressionistic landscapes and cityscapes, interior scenes of her house and studio, vigorous sketches and experimental collages.

Goodman sees her role as an educator as being integral to her artistic identity and in 2000, she co-established the Royal Drawing School with HM King Charles III, to address the increasing absence of observational drawing in art education. She has a longstanding interest in artists’ development and education, as well as the importance of drawing skills to underpin creative practice, both in fine art disciplines and more broadly in the creative industries. She continues in her role as Founding Artistic Director and Academic Board Member and has been a Lieutenant of the Royal Victorian Order since 2014, for her services to the school.

Goodman studied at London’s Camberwell School of Arts & Crafts and the Royal Academy Schools, at which she won the Royal Academy Gold Medal in 1987. Her painting of Antony Sutch won First Prize in the BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery in 2002, following which the Gallery commissioned her painting of Dame Cicely Saunders for its collection. She has had numerous solo exhibitions including Portraits from Life at the National Portrait Gallery in 2014. Goodman was artist-in-residence at Hauser & Wirth Somerset from January to May 2018, ahead of her solo exhibition with the gallery in January 2019. Her paintings are held in numerous private and public collections including the National Portrait Gallery, the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge and the Royal Collection Trust.