We Are Creators Artists in Residence 2026

We support the professional development of emerging artists based in Cheltenham and Gloucestershire through our artist studio programme. An opportunity to apply for a studio at The Wilson provides artists with the time and space to help develop their practice, to enable it to thrive in new ways in the future. Benefits to the artists include regular mentoring, talks and workshops.

Meet the resident artists for 2026

Alice Biggadike

Alice Biggadike is a multidisciplinary artist based in Cheltenham with a First in Fine Art from Chelsea College of Arts. She uses sculpture, painting and textiles to present a surreal interpretation of the world around her.

Alice’s goal in this residency is to use the resources to the full to develop her practice: With a larger working space, she plans to take her surreal spaces out of her paintings and into installation, combining her skills in sculpture, painting and sewing and passion for set and costume design to create a more immersive collection of work. She also aims to incorporate some of the museum’s collection as a base of inspiration. “I hope to look to the past to find archival techniques and apply them to my work, I believe the success of the future relies on the wisdom of the past.”

Atul Bhunkal

Atul Bhunkal is a contemporary artist who moves through painting, performance, and installation as one moves through meditation; slowly, intuitively, and toward an inner light. His practice searches for what he calls “another abode,” a subtle realm beyond thought where silence gathers shape. Atul’s work could be understood as a moment on the pathway transitioning between the physical and spiritual self. By his works, he demonstrates that “meditation is not disconnecting but, it is reconnecting.”

Inspired from the wisdom of the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita, he works with colour and pattern as if they were breathing energies: vibrations that calm, lift, and realign the inner self. His gestures often dissolve the boundaries between body and spirit, inviting viewers into a space where perception softens and presence deepens. His work acts as a quiet threshold, as a momentary pause in an accelerating world, offering the healing stillness we forget we carry within.

Albert Chung

Hong Kong-born artist Chun Chi Albert CHUNG creates contemporary ink paintings that bridge cultural traditions and modern spirituality. Using layered washes on Xuan paper, he builds luminous, abstract fields. His work, conceptually linked to Rothko, serves as a vessel for positive energy, offering a sanctuary for contemplation and inner peace. CHUNG’s art is an offering of harmony, aiming to transcend cultural boundaries with a universal visual language of tranquility.

Albert will create contemporary ink paintings as a universal language of light. For my 2026 project, “Lighthouses for Cheltenham,” he will create an immersive sanctuary of large-scale works. This community-focused installation reinterprets the lighthouse as a symbol of hope, offering a tranquil space for public reflection and connection through art.

Katie Mary

Katie Mary is a transdisciplinary artist based in Cheltenham. The cross-sector approach to her creative practice amplifies inclusivity and transcends boundaries, with focus on installation, audience participation and deep theoretical research. Initially beginning her career using analogue photography, over time, and advances in technology, her practice has explored a variety of media and presentation methods, including international exhibition and ethnology.

Katie plans to continue with her ongoing projects exploring agriculture, protein folding and cybersecurity under a newly titled umbrella project Nature++, producing sensory and kinetic 3D works that also have sustainable qualities. Her aim is to widely share her passion and knowledge for contemporary creative practice through workshops at The Wilson, online tutorials and exhibition of her works.

Eddie Langham

Eddie Langham (They/Them) is a multidisciplinary artist working across fashion, moving image, performance, and photography. Their practice explores transformation, hybridity, and materiality, how cloth, body, and image merge to form new corporeal narratives. As a Trans* artist based in Cheltenham, their work investigates identity and the mutability of the queer body, approaching making as both catharsis and ritual. Drawing on a background in fashion and performance, they use costuming, movement, and sound to create hybrid works that blur the boundaries between spectacle, ritual, and self-revelation.

During their residency at The Wilson, they aim to develop a multidisciplinary performance installation exploring the intersections of identity, trauma, and mental health. Building on the history of restraint in psychiatric care, the project reimagines garments of containment as sites of empowerment. Transforming narratives of “madness” and control into acts of visibility, reclamation, and care.

Jennifer Susan Hughes

Jennifer Hughes is a multi-media artist who appreciates time to create independently and work in an atmosphere of shared creativity. She enjoys exploring themes through a range of materials and techniques, layering thoughts and imagery, combining elements of reality and imagination to create work that can be exhibited in multi-sensory and textural installations. Colour, pattern, repetition and a reworking of recycled materials are distinctive features, with the aim of suggesting new possibilities and reimagining.

During the residency, Jennifer aims to respond to objects and textiles in the collection, exploring museum and community themes of visibility and invisibility, care and repair. Can items from the collection be the starting points for sharing past and present, individual and collective stories and thoughts? The artist hopes to be able to make work in a way that stitches together story and creativity, reflecting and celebrating our diverse community.

Richard Woods

Richard Woods is a figurative painter from Cheltenham. In recent times, his artwork has evolved into woodcarving and printmaking. The works follow imaginative compositions fuelled by nature, history and experiences. The bold style reflects his interest in German Expressionism, Scottish Figurative Art of the 1980s and Street Art. Recent projects have included exploring his time working as a gardener and a new body of work based on time spent in Las Vegas. He has exhibited across the UK and abroad.

During his residency, Richard will look to progress his printmaking and woodcarvings. Using Cheltenham and the Wilson’s collection as a subject to respond to. He looks forward to collaborating and learning from other artists, whilst delivering workshops
and talks.

Sarah Fox

Sarah builds spaces where people can draw, animate and respond to sound together — ‘Visual Music Jam’ workshops for people looking for an alternative way to express themselves. A Cheltenham artist, she works with analogue experimental animation techniques like stop motion, draw-on-paper-film, collage, mark making, projections and simple DIY setups that keep everything accessible. Her practice began during her BA in Illustration at the University of Gloucestershire, where she first started drawing and animating music. Her work is about creating inclusive, collective experiences for people who enjoy music but don’t always feel comfortable in typical social settings.

Sarah is interested in turning complex feelings into moving images and offering a creative space that feels safe, grounded and shared. During the residency, Sarah will explore new analogue techniques, build a visual library and develop her Visual Music Jam workshops to test how sound-led drawing can bring people together through rhythm and collaboration.

Steven Tatlow

Steven Tatlow is a self-taught photographer and designer from Cheltenham. He was a winner of the Portrait of Britain in 2023 and has since been shortlisted for the British Photography Awards as well as the Portrait of Humanity. His work has appeared in The Times, The Guardian, and It’s Nice That, and his practice spans portraiture, design, collage and animation.

During his residency, Steven hopes to develop three strands of work: Chalk, a photographic series documenting Cheltenham’s climbing community; an ongoing self-portrait and collage project exploring meditation, religion, and the phases of a spiritual path; and a study of alternative communities across Gloucestershire.

Find out more about previous Artists in Residence at The Wilson

Meet the artists from the 2025 programme:

Sammi Fletcher is a multidisciplinary artist based in Cheltenham. She is interested in opening conversations, talking across barriers and how to achieve that in an increasingly divisive landscape. She works to interrogate conscious and unconscious bias from an intersectional feminist perspective, exploring the cracks and edges of society – the voids caused by hegemonic values and mass media, and their impact on our psyches. Through an auto theoretical approach, she examines the dichotomies between abjection, desire, identity and fragmentation – and how society frames us all.

Throughout this residency at The Wilson, she will work to continue her research into unruly, non-conforming bodies and their place in our world. She aims to do this through a process of solo work, and work with the wider public – and how those conversations collide, mingle, and develop new narratives.

Loz Apperly is a Cheltenham based writer, musician, and short filmmaker, interested in challenging concepts of narrative, myth and memory. Combining new digital tools with traditional analogue techniques, he draws from (and expands on) his own collection of audio field recordings, short stories, sketches, and video footage to produce a series of multimedia films/animations that seek to explore our understanding of place and meaning within the collective spaces we live in.

During his residency at The Wilson, Loz will situate his work loosely following the course of the river Chelt alongside collecting stories and audio/visuals from the town and its residents. The proposed project for the residency, Hidden River, aims to investigate the symbiosis between the lesser-known stories and lives of the people of Cheltenham and the hidden nature of the river itself as it weaves its way around and under the town.

Emily Oswald is an artist, based in Cheltenham, with her practice centred in sculpture and printmaking. Her work explores the dynamic interplay between materials, focusing on how they connect and transform. A self-taught woodturner, Emily incorporates heritage woodworking techniques, alongside metalworking methods to realise intricate, layered pieces. She combines organic line and form with geometric precision, creating a visual dialogue that invites contemplation of structure and variability. Emily’s practice reflects her passion for experimenting with materials, including wood and precious metals, exploring connectivity through a variety of processes. Movement is a recurring theme, both as a conceptual focus and in the energy embodied in her work.

During her residency at The Wilson, Emily intends to share insights into the development of her practice and encourages “slow looking,” engaging viewers with interactive elements and mindful observation of material relationships.

Grace Gatley is a mixed-media embroidery artist with a degree in Textile Design from Falmouth University. She fuses traditional techniques with contemporary design, inspired by historical buildings, churches and cathedrals. Ornately carved masonry and Victorian stained glass lend pattern and palette to her practice, and she often works with botanical dyes and real flowers; preserving and reflecting fragile natural beauty in print and stitch as in carved stone.

During her residency at The Wilson, Grace plans to make two collections of work: one will continue to explore themes of faith and spirituality in relation to individual and communal creativity, using the mediaeval Cheltenham Minster as a point of reference. The other will be informed and inspired by the wealth of beautiful artefacts in The Wilson’s Arts and Crafts collection. She is passionate about keeping the craft of embroidery alive and hopes to share these skills in workshops at Wilson Nights.

Jussara Nazare is a multidisciplinary Gloucester based artist with a focus on afro-queer surrealist art & performance. Her work is full of colour, patterns and life as it blooms in many forms. From handmade jewellery, zines and print, up-cycled fashion, handcrafted paintings, murals and more. Jussara’s formal training is in Graphic Design, but she has been making art, clothes and zines since she was a teen.  Her current projects include Muses of Glos, a QPOC performance collective; Drag Performances including Knob Ross, a satirical Bob Ross themed Burlesque highlighting the injustice of Bob Ross Inc. and the zine series, Adventures of Ducky, a first person (duck) guide to raves, festivals, expression and safe partying!

During her residency, Jussara hopes to create installations, deliver workshops and expand her practices in sustainable fashion and photography. Her aim is to make your life sweeter by the minute you’re around her high energy and passion for creativity.

Helena Doyle is a multi-disciplinary artist, filmmaker and educator working across mediums including installation, sculpture, video, textiles, street theatre and land art. Exploring the connection between immersion and wellbeing, she centres ‘Sanctuary’ as a major theme in her work, creating spaces and experiences that encourage contemplation. Helena engages in the reimagining of folk textiles and heritage crafts, seeking to uncover the common, universal threads that connect us to both one another and the land. She believes in crafting as a tool for healing and community building and facilitates workshops and collaborative projects where participants create collective installations together.

During her residency at The Wilson, Helena plans to refine her techniques for recycling textiles into sculptural wall pieces and installations, focusing on creating a cohesive new body of work.

Adam Rush is a sculptor and ceramicist. He has been specialising in sculpture for 10 years and closely studying the technicalities of ceramics for 3 years. He graduated in Contemporary Art and Design with a specialisation in Sculpture. His work draws from personal experience and serves as a method of storytelling. He explores themes of anxiety, depression, and temporality, occasionally incorporating humour. The result is expressive and touching artworks that create an instant connection with the viewer. Each piece is based on personal experience and aims to provoke thought and emotion.

Through his residency at The Wilson, Adam will continue to refine his distinctive approach to ceramics.

Harriet Hughes is a mixed media artist who uses dolls to satirise consumer culture in order to explore labour and production’s relationship to gender. Through kitsch prints, collages, ceramics and textile works the ways in which media and advertising exploit self-perception at the expense of profit are questioned. Surrealist spaces are created, allowing a reinterpretation of domestic objects which ask us to critically reflect on the mundane rituals in our lives.

In this residency, Harriet aims to further develop her understanding of her materials and the recurring symbols that appear in her work. She hopes to expand on her interest in commercially produced objects by researching and responding to the Wilson’s collection. Invested in Gloucestershire’s emerging creative scene, she hopes to expand on the network of rural creatives through the WAC community and the Wilson’s public programme.

Meet the artists from the 2024 programme:

Dominyka’s creative practice is research and experiment-led, utilising images, film, mixed-media & digital animation, text and soundscape. Dominyka is continuously trying to find a balance between the real, the digital, the handmade and the archival, as well as the private and the public; and is experimenting with methodologies that might help weave these subtleties together. She recently graduated with an MA in Illustration from the University of Gloucestershire.

During the residency at The Wilson, Dominyka will continue her inquiry into Emotional Geographies of (Un)Belonging; what does it mean to (un)belong and to what/whom/where do we really belong?

How can this emotion, the lack of it, and the manipulation of it, render public spaces into political places? Dominyka will endeavour to work with interdisciplinary artists and local communities, co- creating an immersive narrative installation, questioning and communicating thoughts, ideas, truths and feelings surrounding our sense of belonging to spaces and places.

Genaro Martinez Medina is a freelance Illustrator and Designer originally from Mexico. He has a first class degree in Illustration from the University of West England.

He is a multidisciplinary artist, working predominantly with traditional materials such as watercolours, coloured pencils, gouache, combining the layers digitally to create a final image. He also has a keen interest in working with different types of paper and creating Artist Books taking inspiration from his surroundings as well as Mexican culture.

During his residency at The Wilson he plans to create more Artist Books focussing on immigration and the local area. In addition, he will utilise the studio space to build his portfolio further.

Jade L A Fisher is a disabled portrait photographer. Jade uses her photography to provoke conversations around diversity and inclusion. Her passion is in capturing stories that are often unheard, whilst creating imagery that includes underrepresented groups. Her mission is to create a safe space for everyone to express themselves and their unique identities through her photographic work.

In Jade’s ongoing photographic study, Do You See Me? She focuses on individuals within the frame rather than their hidden or visible disability. In a society that too often sees disability rather than the person, this project aims to raise awareness and give individuals a platform to tell their story in their own words.

During her residency at The Wilson, Jade will explore different ways of making her work more accessible.

Jo is a sculptor interested in the intangible and how to cultivate it. Her flexible approach allows a blend of methods including writing, drawing, play and invention. By simultaneously working on multiple large scale works at one time, the objects in the studio become part of a narrative, much like actors on a stage.Through hybridity and thinking through making, she seeks to bridge the gap between the ephemeral and the concrete.

Jo’s journey is one of collaboration and growth, she seeks conversational learning, engaging with others to share and shape ideas and connections. Looking ahead she will continue to combine textiles and sculpture, drawing inspiration from specific items in The Wilson’s collection. Alongside her sculptural work, she is committed to devising strategies for addressing accessibility issues in written texts accompanying art exhibitions, creating clear and available alternatives.

Megan Burridge is a Cornish artist who is inspired by organic forms, nature, and landscapes. Her work considers how people relate to place, as well as her own personal connection to the landscape she is situated within.

Whether working in paint or clay, Megan’s work explores the textural, colour and natural possibilities within the medium. Often using alternative firing methods such as pit firing, and exploring local and recycled materials where possible, her practice itself is a means of connecting with her environment and its products.

During her residency at The Wilson, Megan is looking to situate her work in the context of the Cotswolds, by understanding how the local history and culture shape the landscape. She also intends to explore local natural resources, by foraging and growing materials to create her own paints, dyes and ceramic glaze ingredients.

Millie Elliott is a photographic artist from Cheltenham. Her practice combines images and materials from personal and found photo albums, where ink and decades of mould have warped and weathered the images, bringing them together into otherworldly artworks that blur the line between nostalgia and dreams. Inspired by childhood and play, some materials come from school workbooks, home films and treasured ephemera collected from multiple generations.

During her residency at The Wilson, Millie will explore themes of nostalgia, dreams and the disappearance of the physical family photo album. She is also looking forward to working in a space with other creatives and developing a creative community.

Nic Pehkonen is a multidisciplinary artist based in Cheltenham. He is also the self-appointed curator and permanent artist in residence at the Nuclear Information Centre (NIC), a simultaneously real and fictional organisation.The NIC is an open-ended research project and nomadic visitor centre exploring the cumulative legacy and ongoing manifestations of human- generated nuclear activity.

The UK is currently searching for a suitable site in which to bury its ever-growing inventory of high-activity radioactive waste deep underground in a highly engineered Geological Disposal Facility or GDF. Nic plans to examine this consent-based siting process through research, public engagement and making, whilst also using his residency at The Wilson to draw speculative parallels between the museum’s repositories and the idea of a GDF as a nuclear archive.

Zariq Rosita-Hanif (she/her) is an autodidact folk art artist of Malaysian origin. She creates artwork that revolves around British natural and cultural heritage using some Malaysian traditional art forms such as Batik (wax-resist dye on fabric) and Wayang Kulit (shadow puppets). The themes of emigration and assimilation are strongly manifested in all of her works. As an émigré, she hopes the elements of fusion in her work will allow her to share her roots and engage the local community.

Through this residency at The Wilson, she aims to further implement sustainability in her practices by exploring and incorporating natural dyes into her Batik work. Under her brand Batikshire, she produces Batik pieces and products that are inspired by British woodlands and countryside.

 

Meet the artists from the 2023 programme:

Joe is a sculptural artist from Manchester, now based in Gloucester. He has a BA in Fine Art from Leeds Arts University and has focused on exhibitions and workshops in the north and the west of England. His practice explores themes of mental health and human connection through sculpture and installation. His main subject is the human form and portraiture, seen throughout his work juxtaposed with other mediums such as sound or film.

He hopes to use this space to develop his practice and to connect with other artists and to explore collaborative projects within the community. Through workshops and open studios, he hopes to find inspiration and a better understanding of his work.

Sean Savage Ferrari is an artist and environmentalist working to weave relationships between land, body and spirit. He seeks to contribute to the climate debate and address the notion of separation between humans and nature.

In his project ‘under concrete, there is always earth’ in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest, he gathered natural materials and crafted work that embodied the landscape and its history. He developed a process of foraging as a method of art making to uncover the heritage of material embedded in the land.

Sean will use The Wilson’s Arts and Craft Collection to investigate weaving, patchwork, carving and pattern design to create paintings and sculptures from gathered materials around the Cotswolds.

Sarah Goddard is a sight-impaired mixed-media artist, based in Cheltenham. The colours, shapes, textures and patterns of the natural world can calm or enliven us, and Sarah draws inspiration from them.

Sarah sees large views out of focus, but then a colour or the hint of a shape may catch her eye, and she will want to look at that object in detail.

Sarah intends to create art that reflects this way of interacting with nature, working in watercolour, acrylic, pastel and mixed media, including tactile elements and field recordings. Her landscape artworks will be based on open spaces in and around Cheltenham. This will include collaborative work, capturing responses to shared open spaces.

Tolmeia Gregory (she/her) is a 22-year-old artist and climate justice activist whose work focuses primarily on climate change and the many nuanced conversations that come with it. Tolmeia is best known for her digital animations and GIF stickers used on social media, which have been viewed over 10 billion times. She also works in different physical mediums, such as collage, painting and sculpture. Tolmeia is hoping to produce more physical pieces of art, including pieces which help people imagine a better world and what climate action can look like.

Imagination, futurism and ‘solarpunk’ are all themes she would like to explore during her residency.

Tim is a professional illustrator, graffiti artist and muralist from Cheltenham with a first class degree in Illustration (BA) at the University of Gloucestershire, and a masters (MA) in Illustration at the same establishment. He has been a self-employed visual artist since March 2019. He is looking forward to working in a studio away from his home, surrounded by art and artists.

He plans to create large scale, detailed paintings in mixed media, using architecture as a metaphor, depicting certain personality traits and mental states. Tim also welcomes the chance to run workshops, and share any skills, knowledge and tips that he has learned along the way.

Dinesh was born and raised in Cheltenham to Indian parents and has always been surrounded by Indian culture and artifacts. He has a mix of eastern and western cultural influences in his work. Music and art are his passion, having studied sitar at the Kalavant Center for Music and Dance in New York. Music began to influence his artwork greatly in the form of mandala and fluidity in drawing styles. A lot of his artwork is made up from things around the house and discarded items repurposed in an art form.

During his residency, Dinesh is looking to develop and experiment in different forms of media, possibly combining sound, video and animation.

Zack studied Fine Art: Painting at Wimbledon College of Art. His practice explores themes of the uncanny in semi-theatrical paintings of familiar objects and spaces. Using photographs, film and video stills, he paints quiet or understated moments from a larger sequence of events. Paintings are intended to be viewed as part of a larger narrative to reflect his ongoing engagement with the cinematic. Zack was shortlisted for the Contemporary British Painting Prize in 2021.

He plans to storyboard a horror film in Cheltenham, recording scenes in local locations and selecting stills to paint. Preferring to leave out details or explicit scenarios, he will focus on suspense and horror movie tropes.

Holly’s practice looks at making reactionary works that respond to environment, geology and place. Working across mediums in print and sculpture to explore themes of identity, value, materiality and purpose through the repetitive rebuilding, recreation and reassembly of localised, familiar objects (or matter) until they appear unearthly, digitalized and dream-like.

Holly hopes to build connections and community through the fellowship. She is fuelled by working with other creatives and excited to be a part of a team of young artists building the foundations of a new local artistic community. She wants to expand her curatorial knowledge and network, forming new relationships with people locally and internationally.