Artist Statement & CV

Charly Helyar’s work focuses on the human, human connection and the existential struggle. Colour relationships and composition are explored through figurative and abstract drawing and painting. 

 The rigor of drawing acts as a backbone for Charly’s work, underpinning and informing her practice. For her, drawing is a constant source of interest and inspiration. 

Paintings are created from small drawings done from life or amalgamated from memory – a homeless person asleep on a grating in the freezing streets of Toronto; a Renaissance altarpiece; a street dweller wearing only a T-shirt and skirt on a -7 day. These are the reworked in the studio and form the basis for paintings.

She explores scale, from the recent illuminated installation General Situation (2025), which covered 75m sq of oil painting, to tiny oil paintings on copper panel, measuring 5x3.5cm, and painted using surgical glasses. They ask how scale can influence a work; the distance it creates or the intimacy it brings. Cleanse (2024) was an action painting, a 3D installation in a nylon cube, performed live with an audience at Crossness Engines in South East London, and accompanied by music from J.Cocoa.

The Reasons to be Cheerful series (2024) explores aging, sexuality, infertility, war and violence. The large paintings use bright candy colours to tackle difficult subjects and combine drawn elements with a more painterly approach. The composition is dynamic and the paintings boil with life.

A meticulous approach to skills and materials informs Charly’s work. In 2026 she is undertaking a research trip to Italy to study Renaissance fresco. She makes her own gesso and often her own paint; surfaces and grounds are selected on the basis on what they may bring to work and how they may become ‘loaded’ and add meaning.

Curriculum Vitae: Charly Helyar

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