Sammi Lynch talks to Phillip Edward Spradley

Portrait of Sammi Lynch in her studio with her dog, Blue. Photography by Dham Srifuengfung Courtesy of the artist

Sammi Lynch is a London-based artist whose work delves into the emotional and psychological layers embedded within landscapes. Her creative process often begins outdoors, where she creates quick, intuitive pastel drawings in direct response to specific settings. These on-site drawings do more than record visual details—they capture the mood, energy, and atmosphere of a place at a particular moment. In the studio, these initial impressions can evolve into larger-scale paintings and prints that explore how personal memory, changing seasons, and internal experiences shape our understanding of the world around us.

Rather than striving for literal accuracy, Lynch’s paintings emphasize mood, color, and perception. Her gestural brushstrokes, vivid color choices, and tactile surfaces prioritize emotional resonance over topographical precision. In her hands, natural elements like light and space become expressive tools that reflect psychological states. Her works suggest that how we see a landscape is deeply influenced by how we feel in it. Although rooted in specific environments, her compositions avoid overt geographic markers, offering instead scenes that invite multiple interpretations and emotional entry points.

A distinctive aspect of Lynch’s practice is her ongoing return to familiar locations. These repeated visits allow her to observe subtle changes over time—shifts in light, weather, and her own internal responses—which are then layered into her imagery. The resulting body of work functions like a visual journal, tracing not only the evolution of a landscape but also the artist’s relationship with it. These landscapes become repositories of memory and emotion, less about the physical terrain than the lived and felt experience of being there.

The ambiguity in her work—its balance between abstraction and representation—opens space for viewers to engage on a personal level. The intensity of her palette and the expressive handling of material communicate a sensory richness that is as much about feeling as it is about form. Her landscapes do not ask to be recognized as particular places, but to be felt, remembered. In this way, Lynch transforms familiar natural motifs into portals for introspection. 

Lynch studied at Manchester School of Art and Kingston School of Art, and is a graduate of 'The Drawing Year', a postgraduate scholarship program at the Royal Drawing School, London. Lynch is represented by Annely Juda Fine Art. At Art Basel 2025, Annely Juda Fine Art will present two new oils and works on paper. In 2027, they will host her debut solo exhibition with the gallery in their new premises at 16 Hanover Square, London Mayfair.

Blue Islands, 2025. Oil on linen. 48.5 x 87 cm. Courtesy of the artist

Do you think your observational work is more about ‘seeing’ or ‘feeling’? How do you negotiate the tension between these two modes in your practice?

When I’m working from direct observation there is often a sense of urgency when trying to capture the thing that I am seeing, this might be the interaction of shapes or colour, or a sense of changing weather and light. I think that rather than a tension there is a symbiotic relationship between seeing and feeling, even just in selecting a subject to draw or paint I’m engaging in both seeing and feeling. There’s an intuitive sense when I’m looking at something, that it might be satisfying to draw, or could make an interesting painting. This feeling extends to selecting a medium or surface, or which colours to use. 

Dusk by the Pond, 2024. Oil on linen, 36 x 30 cm. Courtesy of the artist

Your use of pastels seems central, not just as a preliminary tool but as a medium with its own voice. What is it about pastel that continues to resonate with you creatively?

There’s an immediacy and accessibility to working with pastels that is very useful if you want to work outside; you have a selection of colours at your fingertips that can pack into your bag or pocket. The textures that you can achieve in pastel are vast, the marks can be manipulated to feel soft or hard, and the colours can be overlayed to vibrate against each other or interact to form new colours. 

I feel that working from life in pastel on paper really informed the way that I began painting in my studio; I would mix my paint to match the palette I have in my collection of pastels, and I would be trying the imitate the energy that you get from a quick pastel mark. Similarly, painting has changed the way that I now work with my pastels - I find that some of the marks I now make are intended to later remind me to do something when painting from that drawing. 

Two Trees Over Water, 2025 Oil on linen. 125 x 85 cm. Courtesy of the artist

When translating a drawing into a painting, do you view the transition as an act of translation, reinvention, or something else entirely?

I think I've always thought of it as translation, generally if I’m working from a drawing its because there is something about it I think I can communicate better in paint, I’m trying to create meaning in a different form. Some of my drawings are fully formed and they’ll have all the information needed to paint from, but it might be more interesting for me to paint from a drawing that is looser and open to interpretation. I’ve been looking recently at the wonderfully economical drawings of Paula Modersohn-Becker, some are just a few marks but there is enough information to paint from. 

Drawing can be a form of memory-making, I’m really paying attention to the thing that I’m looking at in a way that means I can more easily pull it to the front of my mind when I then want to make further work about that subject. 

The Bathers⁠, 2024. Oil on linen, 66 × 51 cm⁠. Courtesy of the artist

Do your printmaking practices offer something different than painting or drawing, perhaps formally or conceptually? How do they fit into the ecosystem of your work?

Printmaking offers me a space to experiment as there is an intrinsic loss of control within many of the processes, I appreciate the fact that the colours look different on the plate than in the print, that the image will reverse, and that the marks might not etch how you think - these discrepancies between the outcome and my expectations offer opportunity for more interesting compositions, marks or colours than I might have originally intended. I try to take these lessons in releasing control into my wider practice through artificially creating restrictions in the way that I draw or paint, such as working with my non-dominant hand or making a drawing without looking at the paper.

Beware the Giant Hogweed, 2024. Oil on linen, 100 x 80 cm. Courtesy of the artist

Repetition and return are key themes in your work. Have there been places that resisted being painted, or places you’ve let go of over time?

There's a hillside near my parents that I would often make drawings of, but the owner has fenced it off, so I can't go and draw there anymore. Now I try to return to that place through making paintings from the older drawings, which is an interesting way to maintain a relationship with a place. 

I do like to return to places to make work, I think it’s a great way to check in with yourself and feel how you and the work might have developed since last time. My mum really instilled in me the appreciation of walking a regular route and noticing the daily or seasonal changes. Even if it's quite a mundane walk around the block with the dog. We'd stop and look at a tree and be like, "This time a month ago, it was dark” or “there were no leaves” or “there was blossom.” 

Although I have lived in London for years, I feel as if the city slightly resists me. Perhaps if I were to move to somewhere rural I’d start wanting to paint skyscrapers.

Red Sun, 2024. Oil on canvas mounted on wooden panel, 30 x 20 cm. Courtesy of the artist

Is there a difference in how you approach a landscape that is familiar versus one that’s new to you? Does novelty or nostalgia shape your response?

I’m currently Artist in Residence on a National Trust estate in rural Wales, when I arrived I felt that excited anticipation of a new landscape, everything feels fresh and everything has potential. I’m seeing it all with hungry eyes. 

A familiar landscape can be more like hanging out with an old friend, seeing what is enduring and what is new. I enjoy the feeling of recognising something that I’ve drawn or painted from a previous visit, a tree or rock might take on a certain character when I’m working from drawings in the studio, so to see them again in the wild is strangely familiar. There's more of an intimacy in a space that you know, but I feel like you can build intimacy quite quickly with a new place, especially if you’re making drawings. 

Many of your works seem to hover between day and night, between clarity and haze. Are you drawn to thresholds such as dawn, dusk, or seasonal change as a visual or emotional territory?

I like drawing at the dawn / dusk threshold points because I find that I get more interesting marks and compositions. Either I’m beginning a drawing in the dark and as it gets lighter I get more clarity to what I’m seeing or, at dusk, I’m drawing into the dark and everything starts to disintegrate as you have less light to work by. 

Another threshold I am interested in at the moment is the surface of a painting, I like paintings that come into focus as you move away from them but offer another reading up close.

Down to the Water, 2024. Oil on canvas mounted on wooden panel, 30 x 20 cm. Courtesy of the artist

Are there particular writers, thinkers, or even musicians who shape your understanding of place and emotion in your work?

I think that the poet Mary Oliver is a great companion. A poem of hers that I’m reading at the moment describes the reasons she likes to be alone in the woods, and it finishes ‘If you have ever gone to the woods with me, I must love you very much.’ - I think that her poems are so wonderful because through language she does take us into the woods with her. 

Everyday people shape my understanding of place. Earlier today I was painting this huge magnolia tree that was leaning over a cottage. An older man came out of the cottage to see what I was doing and proceeded to tell me about his relationship with this old tree; he’d lived there for 20 years and compared the tree to romantic relationships he had had - he loved the tree but he was worried that it might fall in a storm and crush him in his bed. 

Warm and Damp, 2025. Pastel on paper, 20 x 29.5 cm. Courtesy of the artist

To learn more about Sammi Lynch, follow her on Instagram and visit Annely Juda Fine Art