BIOGRAPHY
Celia Montague is a painter based in England and works between studios in Oxford and Venice.
She graduated in Modern and Mediaeval Languages from St. Hugh’s College, Oxford. After life drawing studies at the Ruskin School of Art, her formal training as a painter was at Heatherley’s School of Drawing and Fine Art in London, where she took the Diploma in Portraiture (2007–2009), and then studied life painting for a further two years at the Royal Drawing School.
She is committed to painting in front of her subject and her landscapes are painted en plein air. In bad weather in England she has the comfort and shelter of her beloved painting van. One of the pleasures of painting her portraits always in the presence of the sitter is the friendships that these beget.
Since 2010 she has exhibited with several galleries in Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire and London, with London solo shows in 2012 and 2022. Since 2014 she has been represented by Cricket Fine Art in Chelsea, London, and also since 2022 by the Zuleika Gallery in Woodstock, Oxfordshire.
Painting was not her first career, though it was a great love from an early age. She chose to train as a lawyer after Oxford University, and qualified and practised as a barrister in London chambers before swerving into a career as an actor, in theatre, television and film (playing leading and supporting roles for the BBC) while bringing up two sons.
She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
EXHIBITIONS
Solo exhibitions:
2022 'A Light in the Heart' at Cricket Fine Art, 2 Park Walk, London SW10
2012 'Eden' at The Gallery, 54 Shepherd Market, London W1
Joint exhibitions include:
2014 - present Cricket Fine Art, London
2022 - present Zuleika Gallery, Woodstock, Oxfordshire
2021/2/3/4 Cricket Fine Art
2022 Green & Stone Summer Exhibition, London SW3
2020 Cricket Fine Art
2019 Cricket Fine Art
2018 Cricket's Little Picture Show, Hungerford
2017 Faces of Ruskin Exhibition, Exeter College, Oxford
2017 Kyffin Gallery, Woodstock, Oxfordshire
2016 Cricket Fine Art, 2 Park Walk, Chelsea. Mixed Christmas Show.
2016 Fosse Gallery, Stow-on-the-Wold. Christmas Exhibition of Gallery Artists
2016 Mall Galleries, The Mall, London SW1: Lynn Painter Stainers Prize 2016
2016 St. Hugh's College, Oxford, Festival of Anniversaries Exhibition
2015/16 Fosse Gallery, Stow-on-the-Wold, Mixed Exhibition
2015 Summer Collection, Iona House Gallery, Woodstock, Oxford
2015 Venice in Peril, Osborne Studio Gallery, 2 Motcomb Street, London SW1
2014 20/21 British Art Fair, Royal College of Art
2014 Cricket Fine Art, London SW10
2014 AAF Battersea
2014 Chelsea Arts Club
2013/14 Fosse Gallery, Stow-on-the-Wold, Christmas Exhibition
2013 Browse and Darby, London W1, Summer exhibition 'Gallery Artists'
2013 Browse and Darby, London W1, Spring exhibition 'Gallery Artists'
2013 Fosse Gallery, Christmas Exhibition
2013 Fosse Gallery, Summer Exhibition
2013 Fosse Gallery, Spring Exhibition
2012 Fosse Gallery, Christmas Exhibition
2010/11/12/13 Swann Gallery, Woodstock, Oxon
2012 1 Essex Court, Temple, London EC4
2011 Oxford Town Hall
2011 Blackwell's Book Shop, Oxford
2011 St. Barnabas Church, Oxford
2009/10/11 Said Business School, Oxford
2008/9 Heatherleys, London
