Lily Bunney Discusses Her Pixelated Paintings and Upcoming Exhibitions

Lily Bunney, a painter from the West Midlands near Rugby, creates detailed paintings that resemble low-resolution digital images. She studied Fine Art at Central Saint Martins but initially focused on performance and puppetry, graduating in 2020 without a degree show due to the pandemic. She later turned to painting, finding inspiration from her job teaching expelled children, where she used maths exercise books during lunch, leading to her signature grids. Her work has been shown at Milosc gallery and Guts Gallery, including the exhibition 'Girls Peeing on Cars'. Bunney's process involves sourcing images from social media, books, and movies, then digitally processing them with Photoshop filters originally meant for knit patterns. She creates digital sketches, seeks feedback from friends, and transfers the images to canvas. Notable works include 'Light Comes in from All Sides', a commission for Norwich Cathedral and Sainsbury Centre created with local young people using glass beads, and 'Jenny (Sleeping on Camera)', inspired by the JenniCam archive, shown at Twilight Contemporary. 'Nigella (Pensive)', a large painting of Nigella Lawson, was made for a show at Saatchi Gallery and is semi site-specific. Bunney has more exhibitions planned this month and in the new year, and she aims to work on her own timeline without gallery pressures. She is also interested in gestures and horses, which may appear in future work.