For the latest in our Culturalee in Conversation series, Culturalee Editor Lee Sharrock interviewed artist Emma Loizides about her new solo exhibition at Zebra One Gallery in Hampstead, London.
Having spent years painting escapist scenes inspired by the palm trees and neon skies of America and the cinematic worlds of the silver screen, Loizides now finds inspiration in the landscapes and familiar landmarks on her doorstep in North London. Following her move into a new studio in Chalk Farm in 2026, the artist has rediscovered the places that have shaped her life, from Primrose Hill and Parliament Hill to Hampstead Ponds and the Camden canal. Her Hampstead exhibition features paintings that result from a deeply personal homecoming, reconnecting with the neighbourhood where her family grew up and where her own painting journey began.
Rendered in rich, expressive layers of textured paint and delicate pastel skies, Loizides’ paintings present an idealised vision of London, stripped of crowds and traffic and suspended in the stillness of the early hours. An ice cream van on a hillside, a traditional pie and mash menu or a distant skyline beginning to twinkle become evocative details in compositions that balance familiarity with a sense of dreamlike escapism. In Familiar Ground, Loizides invites us to look again at the places we think we know, finding beauty, memory and unexpected moments of tranquillity in the everyday landscape.
Culturalee in Conversation with Emma Loizides
Your artistic journey began in a rather unconventional way, moving from a career in banking to discovering oil painting through Saturday art classes, and then to a successful career as a full-time artist. How did that transition shape your relationship with painting, and when did you realise that art would become a central part of your life?
I have always been creative. Even when I was working in banking, I sketched the Canary Wharf skyline on my lunch breaks and always had a canvas or sketchbook in my bag. I then moved to Deutsche Bank, where the art programme, with its tours and talks, made me want to learn more and paint properly. I took painting courses and painted around work for years, and my first exhibition was in the lobby of the Bank of Nevada in Las Vegas, nearly twenty years ago. I knew painting was central to my life long before it was my job. In 2022, my painting was accepted for the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, and I went full time. Life doesn’t always go to plan, and at times I have had to balance painting with other work, but it is what I always come back to.
Travel, memory and a sense of escapism have long informed your work, from the neon-lit streets of Las Vegas to the sun-drenched landscapes of Florida. What is it about these places, their architecture, colours and atmosphere that continues to fascinate you? How do you translate the experience of being somewhere into the dreamlike worlds that emerge on your canvases?
I am a Londoner, so I have always looked at America as an outsider, with the fascination for somewhere different that we know from the movies. The light seems brighter, and I love the expansive skies and tall palm trees. I am drawn to the colourful aesthetics and nostalgic charm of diners, motels, neon signs and gumball machines.
I spent much of my twenties in America and lived in Las Vegas for a few years, so these are happy memories I often revisit in my work. I build the paintings from road-trip photos, sketchbooks and memory. I spend a lot of time blending the sky, because a sunset does much of the work in creating that dreamlike world. Everyone appreciates a beautiful sunset, and I am trying to capture that moment when we stop to take it in.
Your paintings often depict familiar urban environments stripped of people, traffic and the usual distractions of city life, creating an intriguing stillness that feels both nostalgic and cinematic. What draws you to these quiet, almost suspended moments, and how does your love of cinema influence the way you compose a scene, use light and build atmosphere?
I like the city when it is quiet. I am drawn to early morning, when no one is around. I paint idealised, empty versions of places, and I am interested in the calm, and sometimes the melancholy or mystery, of those sunrise hours. Cinema has influenced how I compose a scene. In some ways a painting is like a still from a film: a considered composition, a single moment, often the one just before something happens. Light sets the mood, whether it is an optimistic soft dawn sky or a skyline just beginning to twinkle.
Your forthcoming solo exhibition ‘Familiar Ground’ at Zebra One Gallery in Hampstead marks a particularly personal chapter in your practice, turning your attention towards the streets and landscapes of Camden, Primrose Hill and Hampstead Heath. Having spent years painting places further afield, what inspired you to explore your own neighbourhood?
This year is a fresh start. I have moved house, I have a new studio in Chalk Farm, and I am happy to be painting full time. I have been exploring the new area, and I walk to the studio every day, often through the park, and sketch on the way. Primrose Hill and Parliament Hill are close by. Back in the studio, I paint from the sketches and photographs. My parents grew up in Camden and I spent a lot of time there as a teenager, so it is a familiar landscape that I am now looking at in a new way, noticing different things.” Emma Loizides
The new paintings in ‘Familiar Ground’ capture parks, streets, architecture and expansive views around Hampstead Heath, bringing your signature saturated palette and richly textured brushwork to a distinctly London landscape. How have you approached translating these familiar surroundings into your own romanticised visual language?
I approached painting London in many ways as I approached America, with the same palette of pastel neons, dripping paint and trees reflecting in the shimmering water. I paint on wooden panels and build up many layers of oil colour, working through colour combinations as I go. I admire Wayne Thiebaud’s joy and confidence with everyday objects. I like to add a bit of fun and humour through the small things that make a place feel like home: an ice cream van on a hill, a pie and mash menu, and stillness of the canal in the early morning.
Emma Loizides ‘Familiar Ground’ is at Zebra One Gallery, 73a Hampstead High Street, London from 17-30 November.
Follow Emma here.
