COMMISSIONS

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Billie was born in Gibraltar in 1948. Her father was in the army and the
family moved around Europe throughout her childhood. In 1964 she started to study art for 4 years in Farnham Surrey. She went on to do a years post-graduate studies in St Ives Cornwall.

In the early 70 she met and married Peter Mallett and together with their growing family they moved to north Cornwall. Early in their life together Peter and Billie converted to Christianity. They started a "house Church" which quickly grew and Peter became a full time pastor while Billie home schooled their four children and became responsible for the music as well as other duties in the church community. During these years Billie stopped painting completely.

The Malletts moved to Exeter in 2000 ,which turned out to be the beginning of the "wilderness years" for them, many hard times and difficulties in church relationships and eventually in health. Peter died after a short "skirmish' with cancer in 2002. lt was after this that Billie lunged herself headlong into her painting again. She found in time she was able to redefine her self in her own right as a woman alone, but also as a painter.

Having traveled to New Zealand three times in the last three years, Billie is wondering if she might be able to live in both the UK and New Zealand, painting and selling her work in both countries.

She has had opportunity to do a few portraits and is happy to take commissions. Nevertheless; she comments, "don't come to me if you want your portrait to look like a photo! l paint what l see on the inside, through the persons eyes."

She has been working hard to build up a body of work and now feels
she has enough to have a one woman show, this is something she is hoping to get on the go soon.

"l paint large paintings because the larger they get, the more at home l feel with them. I have always had this feeling that l am really big, which is strange as l am so physically small, just under 5 ft , but l feel like l have this vast expansive country stretching out for miles and miles inside me. When l paint a person l want it to feel as if they are inside the room with you; their presence, which is so much bigger;and more than their mere physical being ... You can feel when a person is in a room with you even when they are behind you. That's what l am going for: the essence of a person's being. l believe that we are spiritual beings as well as physical and it is the spirit l am after;the real you."

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