Salina Jane is an artist, illustrator and printmaker living and working in Croydon/London. Born and brought up in London to Indo-Caribbean, parents from Guyana. She has always had a passion for art and storytelling in pictures and has drawn from a very young age. As a child she loved illustrated children’s books and fairy tales and dreamed of being a book illustrator. She loves to share creativity through community projects and teaching.
Salina studied art at WSCAD, in Farnham, (now UCA) and graduated with a BA (Hons) in Fine Art, printmaking. She expresses herself through drawing, particularly with ink, creating many small details which draw the viewer in. These days Salina is primarily working on larger scale drawings full of the colours of her heritage, and culture, in charcoal, pastels and tea!
Salina in interested in contemporary artists who are engaged in projects regarding identity she sights Paula Rego, Sonya Boyce and Jennifer Packer as influence on her work along with David Dabydeen, a Guyanese born, novelist, poet and academic working in Caribbean studies. “My inclination to paint, especially from life, is a completely political one. We belong here. We deserve to be seen and acknowledged in real time. We deserve to be heard and to be imagined with shameless generosity and accuracy’. Jennifer Packer.
Much of Salina’s work is concerned with telling stories, of life in London, her passions, hobbies and family culture and history. She creates portraits and tells others’ stories through the series, “Let me illustrate your life and loves” which she has been creating since 2011. https://www.salinajaneart.com/let-me-illustrate-your-life-and-loves.html She makes illustrations of the craft community including ‘The Journey Shawl’, a collaboration with L. Fay.
In December 2021 Salina had her first large scale solo exhibition where she created a series of work for the space in Queens Park Arts centre, which later partially moved to Matthews Yark in Croydon in January 2022 for 8 months. She exhibited a series of work, exploring her family background and the experience of Indians who came to Guyana as Indentured labourers and then to the UK as part of the Windrush generation
Indentured labour experience, Guyana, 2018. My story.
I am on a journey, one in which I hope to discover what moving across continents would have been like for my family, and others on a similar path. What hopes prompted these great moves, what were their hardships and successes? Both my parents are Guyanese as were their parents and their grandparents. My Great Great Grandparents were indentured labourers who came from India. It’s a story not well known in the UK, its not something I learnt in school, yet it was the British Empire that moved indentured workers so far from home. My work in this series seeks to tell their story and, in some way, to express what life must have been life for them and to give them a voice so they are not forgotten. I have chosen mediums and images that I hope express the conflict of emotions that this brings for me and I imagine must have been there for my grandparents and great grandparents. I salute and thank then, I would not be here to have the privilege to tell this story in art if not for their hard work and determination. For Babu and Muradhan Khan. “
Exhibitions
December 2021 – July 2022 – Matthews Yarn, showing 9 large works at this large revolving arts space in Croydon, London.
July 2022 – Summer Wool Festival, Ampthill near Bedford
May 2022 – Spread, group exhibition of work by Turf Studio Members – Turf Projects gallery space, Whitgift Centre, Croydon
April 2022 – Wonderwool, Wales – Exhibitor
February 2022 – Unravel Festival, Farnham Surrey – Exhibitor
November to December 2022 – Queens Park Arts Centre, Aylesbury –Following the thread, 2-week solo exhibition. Exhibiting 55 pieces of work in this large arts space, I created, organized, marketed, and delivered events inside the main gallery space to enhance the experience, a live drawing event, workshops included a portrait class and a knit and natter social event.
May 2021 – Unravel Festival, Farnham Surrey – Exhibitor
February 2020 – Unravel Festival, Farnham Surrey
September 2019 – Guyana Speaks – Event on Indentureship – Solo Exhibition at event
July 2019 – Riot Soup ‘The Residency’ – hARTslane Gallery, New Cross, London. Group shop, guest contributor.
June 2019 – Indo-Caribbean London, Culture Fest – Ilford – Solo Exhibition
April-May 2019 – Croydon Art Society Members Exhibition – Croydon Clocktower
October 2018 – Slaughterhaus + One – Members exhibition, Slaughterhaus Studio, London
October 2018 – Flavas of Africa & the Caribbean – group show – Elizabeth James Gallery, London
September 2018 – Croydon Art Society Members exhibition – Denbies Wine Estate, Surrey
June 2018 – Carib Art Exhibition, group exhibition – The High Commission for The Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, London.
December 2017 – 1st Birthday Exhibition – group exhibition – Elizabeth James Gallery, London
2015 – Dulwich Art Festival, Group Open House Exhibition, London
Events & Projects
September – October 2022 – Artist for ‘Social Fabric’ project – Lewisham Borough of Culture, closing 3 streets in Lewisham and creating art with the public to share the experience of a car free space with Lewisham Climate Action Change.
Jan – Sep 2022 – The Exchange 2, paired with another artist, collaborating to deliver a project at the end of the program.
June 2022 – artist for ‘Sharing our Lives’ with Together Production. Live drawing of the 74th Windrush event, a boat down the Thames from London to Tilbury and live drawing to collect migrant stories of Thurrock alongside an oral historian.
January 2022 – Resident Artist – Day One – Lewisham Borough of Culture – event creation and delivery at Place, Ladywell.
January 2022 – Panel Speaker – British & Guyanese 2nd generation women – talk with Guyana Speaks (virtual)
September 2021 – Resident Artist Knitting & Crochet Guild Unconvention – Live drawing events at the conference
June 2021 – Panelist on Vogue Knitting Live – with Jeanette Sloane – BIPOC makers feature.
May 2021 – Artist in residence – Knit Ted Talks, with Knit 15 / Wild & Woolly, part of Unravel 2021, live drawing of event
September 2020 – Keynote speaker for Knitting and Crochet Guild Unconvention with Luke Fay ‘The Journey Shawl’
December 2017 – Live Art Event, meet the artist and drawing demonstrations – Elizabeth James Gallery, London
