Contemporary artist Sara Pope is known for her bold, seductive paintings of voluptuous lips. Taking inspiration from a successful career in the fashion industry (as a shoe designer for brands such as Paul Smith), and also her work in magazines as a designer and art director, Sara aims to capture the sensuality and seductive power conveyed by the lips and mouth. Interested in questions of beauty, communication, and the rise of image perfectionism, Sara uses the perspective of her commercial experience to explore these themes.

The starting point is a makeup brush and a lipstick. She paints the models lips, then, using tricks and techniques of makeup and lighting, she begins the process of creating the perfect lips.  She asks the model, to express different emotions which she captures photographically. Using these shots as inspiration she begins the artwork. The painting process involves several layers of thin oil-diluted paint being overlaid, blending and smoothing the colours extensively at every stage, sometimes also mixing lipstick into the paint. Emulating the stylistic slickness of advertising, the result is glossy, perfect and irresistible. Sara is currently represented by 19 galleries in the UK and internationally. Last year she completed successful solo shows with Jealous Gallery,  London and Lilford Gallery, Folkestone during the Folkestone Triennial, as well as a joint London show with Magnus Gjoen. 2018 began with a solo show at D Contemporary gallery, Mayfair, London and Sara is currently working towards a solo show at Next Street Gallery, Paris in September. Sara has completed collaborations with The Big Issue, BareMinerals makeup, PIAS music label, and Swedish fashion label Limitato. She is also the first British female artist in over 70 years to have a piece of work accepted into the Vatican collection.

Shuby uses print, collage, paint and photography to create original reinterpretations that revel in absurdity, kitsch and irony. Her cheeky visions are almost dream-like in their Technicolor intensity. She works in a wide variety of mediums including paint, print making, ceramics and reworking found objects. 

Her influences include Josephine Baker, Busby Berkeley, Andy Warhol, Eduardo Paolozzi, Richard Hamilton, Joe Tilson, John Stezaker, Retro advertising, Car Boot Sales, Seaside charity shops and The Carnivalesque. Shuby has also made a large amount of street art that includes paste ups and spray painted shutters. One of her first posters in 2007 was of a lady holding a big banana inspired by the 1943 musical by Busby Berkeley, The Gang’s All Here in which rows of ladies wave comedy bananas in the air. Since then Shuby has used the banana motif throughout her studio work and on the street in many different guises as a naughty but innocent calling card instantly recognizable and subversively humorous.