Teaching ink making in Totnes at The Albatross, August 2022. Photo by Jane Knight.
I live and work in Hexham, UK, making objects from my home-tanned leather and other natural materials, plus drawings and paintings from wild and ancient materials, from small illustrations to large murals. I have taught life drawing, painting, ancient crafts and I currently teach people how to make the materials I use from my studio, online and as a guest at centres across Europe and UK. I currently teach online and in person with Plants and Colour and in person at West Dean College. Having spent decades indoors in art and recording studios, I now spend my life outdoors as much as possible, sourcing my materials, making my work, immersing myself in nature.
I write about the embodied life and art where earth matters every Thursday morning at my Substack, Uncivil Savant.
Caroline Ross
| Education |
2014-2026 With master tanner Theresa Emmerich Kamper
2014-2025 Study at The Royal Drawing School and with Renaissance pigments methods masters
1994-1995 Chelsea School of Art, MA Painting
1991-1994 Kingston University, BA (Hons) Fine Art, Painting
1989-1991 Bournemouth and Poole College of Art and Design, BTEC Art and Design
| Publications |
Forthcoming: A practical guide to painting on leather, suede, buckskin, parchment and canvas, clothes, shoes and containers. Book planned for summer 2027, based on my current in-person and online courses and ongoing research on this topic.
Artist’s letterpress book with Princetown Press, Artemis Scribe, from Imaginal Field Residency, to be published in a hand-numbered edition of 100, February 2026.
Drawn From the Wild – a practical guide to making your own foraged art materials, Search Press, 2025. Ancient, traditional, novel and sustainable methods and materials for foraging and using drawing materials. Translated and published in German and Spanish January 2026.
Found and Ground – a practical guide to making your own foraged paints. Search Press, 2023. Bestselling book of traditional, novel and ecologically sound methods for creating and gathering pigments for paint-making. Translated and published in French, German and Spanish, January 2024
Uncivil Savant, weekly writing on Substack since 2022
Dark Mountain Project: Contributing editor, writer and artist in their books since 2015
| Seleced press and media |
Uppercase Magazine, featured artist in Elements issue, forthcoming, 2026.
Schumacher Magazine, Art Needn’t Cost The Earth, interview with Marina Turlay, October 2025
FFern Found Sounds podcast, As The Seasons Turn, October 2025
They Can’t Code This, video interview with Paul Kingsnorth for the Machine Sessions, August 2025
Videos, In conversation with Iain McGilchrist February 2023 and in May 2025
Forest of Thought Podcast Living an Embodied Life and Crafting the Way, March 2025
Taking Beauty Seriously, Interview The Great Humbling, May 2024
The Simple Things March 2024, featured artist
Patchwork Professional March 2024, featured artist
Heart of Ochre, by Nick Hunt, Perspective Magazine, October 2023
Where Many Rivers Meet 2023, featured artist, The Sublime
Fear Naut Magazine Issue 3: Growth, October 2021, Illustrator
Making a Living Making a Life publication on artistic livelihood and sustainability, Swedish Arts Council 2021, interview
Fire Season Issue 1, 2020 Canadian publication featuring art on forest fires / climate emergency, artwork
Making a Mark Lightly Featured artist in quarterly Earth Island Journal, Autumn 2019
The Clearing magazine, The Eternal Roar of the Dragon by Andreas Kornevall, illustrations July 2019
| Awards, residencies and selected exhibitions |
Upcoming, In Situ Polyculture / Marble House, Vermont USA, May 2026
Imaginal Field Residency Cambridgeshire, June 2025, writing and site-specific art
Wild Pigment Project Exhibition at Form and Concept Gallery, Santa Fe, USA, September-December 2022
Black Light: Dark Mother drawing film with Mat Osmond’s words for Borrowed Time, November 2021
Colours and Ashes, Knockvologan Arts, Mull, artist in residence May 2021, ink-making and natural drawing tools
Wild Pigment Project contributing artist of 4 pigments 2020-2024
Artist in residence at the year-long Fire and Shadow with Way of Nature and Dark Mountain, including time in Scotland and Romania, 2018
Group show ‘Rite Start’ at Kapil Jariwala Gallery, London 1997
Stanley Picker Travelling Scholarship to USA, August 1994
Liquitex Excellence in Art Award, 1994
Solo painting show ‘Into the Trees’ in 1993 at The Lighthouse Gallery in Poole, Dorset
Works on paper and parchment and objects crafted from leather and other natural materials are in many private collections, worldwide.
| Teaching and lecturing |
West Dean Pigment week – Professional Pastel and Watercolour Making, February 2026
Plants and Colour, ongoing online and in-person teaching 2022-2026 including 5 day natural art materials courses Found and Ground and Drawn From the Wild
Turps Art School, London, visiting lecturer 15th January 2024
Ongoing private consultancy and masterclasses in-person and online 2019 onwards, various venues, UK
Pigments Revealed International lectures 2023-4
Schumacher College, solo Found and Ground natural art materials course and with Dark Mountain team
Dark Mountain teaching team 2022-2024 online and in-person courses
Artisans of Now, 5 day natural art materials course, Italy 2024, 2025, 2026
Insitu PolyCulture, VA, USA, 2024, 2025, 2026
Butser Ancient Farm, Introduction to Natural Art Materials one day courses, 2024, 2025
Giant Gallery, Bournemouth, Introduction to natural paints and inks, 7th December 2023
Falmouth University Online Illustration MA, natural materials masterclasses online and in person in Falmouth 2021, 2022.
Wild Twins art and writing course taught with Paul Kingsnorth in-person at Sherkin Island, Ireland, 2018, 2019 and online 2020 and 2021.
Life drawing classes In Molesey, Surrey, 2020-2021
Sweden, natural art materials, various venues 2017-2024
Life drawing and painting tutor, Aberdeenshire, Scotland, in tertiary and adult education settings, 2000-2005
Organiser of Huntly Hairst Arts Festival 2003
Visiting artist teaching on BA and MA courses at Norwich, Sunderland and Bournemouth Universities 1996-1998
| Professional organisations |
Pigments Revealed International
Heritage Crafts Organisation (for the endangered craft of Pigment Making)
Featured in these books:
How I Escaped my Certain Fate by Stewart Lee, 2019, Notes From An Apocalypse by Mark O’Connell, 2020, The Way Home by Mark Boyle, 2020, Hagitude by Sharon Blackie, 2022, After Ithaca by Charlotte DuCann, 2022, At Work in the Ruins by Dougald Hine, 2023
Found and Ground 